Miss Gray tears into the lack of serious leadership – official and political – and the failure to maintain the high standards rightly expected by the public.
For all that, however, the truth is that the report was something of a damp squib.
After the hype and hysteria, little was revealed that we didn’t already know.
To the bitter disappointment of the armies of Boris-haters, the PM was not personally implicated in any bad behaviour, beyond the birthday episode. nor is there evidence he even knew about most parties.
Of course, the Daily Mail understands the anger felt by many that rules made in no 10 were not observed there. these soirees were wrong. the PM’s officials were misguided, and some plainly failed to respect the boundary between work and socialising.
But it took some gall for Sir Keir Starmer, with scarlet-cheeked sanctimony, to denounce Mr Johnson for presiding over a ‘culture of criminality’. Let’s not take lectures from Labour’s leader. this opportunist demanded Mr Johnson resign as soon as the Met started probing Partygate.
Yet now he is engulfed by a police investigation of his own for swigging beer with activists in Durham during lockdown – a breach far more egregious than Boris’s transgression. What a colossal hypocrite.
Despite Miss Gray’s findings, the Damoclean sword still hangs over Mr Johnson. He faces a Commons privileges committee probe over claims he lied to Parliament about no 10 parties.
And the Left and embittered remainers, aided by the BBC (which has dropped all pretence of impartiality in its animus to the PM), are still flogging Partygate to death in the hope of staging a coup d’etat.
For the rest of us, it’s time to turn the page. this whole regrettable saga has been a gigantic waste of time and money.
Mr Johnson must now focus on issues that matter to ordinary people, from the worst cost of living squeeze in a generation to the militant rail unions threatening strikes.
The clock is ticking to the next election. it is imperative to stop Corbyn apologist Starmer winning. that should be something to which we can all raise a glass.