Committee chairman Harman had already declared him guilty
BORIS Johnson quit last night with a blast at the Labour-led Commons Privileges Committee, accusing it of an anti-democratic ‘witch-hunt’.
The former prime minister named committee chairman Harriet Harman, charging her with overseeing a ‘kangaroo court’ after he received its findings over whether he misled Parliament.
Allies of Mr Johnson – who did not rule out a return to Parliament – have been calling for the inquiry to be scrapped since it was announced last summer.
Questions have been raised about the committee’s independence. Ex-Blairite minister Miss Harman has repeatedly said Mr Johnson misled the Commons.
The veteran MP re-posted a blog by former Labour spin doctor Alastair Campbell that said the then PM and chancellor Rishi Sunak ‘broke their own emergency laws. They lied. Repeatedly. They trashed the ministerial code’.
She became chairman of the committee last June. But there was anger that such an ‘overtly political’ figure could lead such a high-profile probe.
She took over from Chris Bryant, who recused himself after repeatedly stating his strong opinion on Partygate, even describing Mr Johnson as a ‘proven liar’.
Miss Harman faced the same calls to go after tweeting that in accepting fines, the then PM and chancellor were ‘admitting they misled the Commons’.
The committee has four Tory MPs, two Labour and one from the SNP. But while the opposition MPs have long been critics of the former prime minister, the Conservative MPs have also hit out at him in the past.
The SNP’s Allan Dorans re-posted a comment saying the initial report by civil servant Sue Gray into Partygate had ‘already proved he [Boris Johnson] lied’. It added: ‘That is and always has been an automatic resignation issue.’
Tory and former Johnson ally Sir Bernard Jenkin skewered him in the days before his resignation, saying: ‘There’s no question, it’s over.’ Chairing the Commons Liaison Committee, he let a Labour MP announce the resignation of members of the Government on live TV.
Conservative ex-journalist and barrister Laura Farris, a backer of Mr Sunak, has been described as a ‘Remainer who hates Boris’. She, Andy Carter and Alberto Costa quit as parliamentary private secretaries to be on the committee investigation.
Labour’s Yvonne Fovargue, an ex-Corbyn shadow minister, shared a post by a Labour MP saying ‘people feel let down, lied to, and laughed at by the Prime Minister and those around him’.
Tory MP Alberto Costa, a backer of Penny Mordaunt, aimed a barb at Boris when he said the next PM must prioritise ‘standards and integrity’.
Fellow Tory Andy Carter has refused to comment on Partygate investigations. But following the ex-PM’s resignation, he said: ‘I believe this is the right thing to do, and is in the nation’s best interests.’