PM ‘would not have made same attack as Rees-Mogg’

DOWNING STREET has sought to distance Boris Johnson from Jacob Rees-Mogg’s verbal attack on a journalist, but declined to issue an apology.

No 10 said yesterday they were “not comments that the PM would’ve made,” but a spokesman chose not to rebuke the Commons leader.

Mr Rees-Mogg abused the HuffPost journalist after he published a leaked video call of Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab telling officials the UK should strike trade deals with nations that do not meet European standards on human rights.

Under the protection of parliamentary privilege, Mr Rees-Mogg called the website’s deputy political editor, Arj Singh, formerly of The Yorkshire Post, a “knave or a fool”, and accused him of “lowquality journalism” in widelycriticised comments. A No 10 spokesman said: “The PM is a staunch believer in the value of the free press and the important role journalists play in our democracy.

“These are not comments that the PM would’ve made.

“These comments were made by Jacob Rees-Mogg and I’m confident that he can explain their intended meaning.”

But the spokesman declined to say whether Mr Rees-Mogg would be told to retract the comments or apologise. HuffPost UK editorin-chief Jess Brammar accused the Commons leader of an “extremely troubling” smear against a journalist.

National Union of Journalists general secretary Michelle Stanistreet accused Ministers of “acting like playground bullies, undermining the work of journalists, bringing their work into disrepute, and dishing out insults that are clearly designed to further inflame harassment and abuse online”.