Aptly named Gray report fails to provide any colour
Publication of the civil servant’s document has left our columnists feeling deflated, but there could yet be a sting in the tail for the Prime Minister
Camilla Tominey Sue Gray underwhelms
He once despaired at the “dither and delay” of Parliament over Brexit, but it seems time has proved a great healer for Boris Johnson. This – and the fact the juiciest contents of Sue Gray’s eagerly awaited report had already been leaked – meant the final version felt a bit like being presented with a birthday cake with some of the slices already eaten.
By producing her interim findings in January, the senior civil servant had already given us a taste of what was going to be served up; that there were “failures of leadership” at the heart of No10 and that leaders who broke the rules they’d set should have known better. Those hoping this final version would be a “cherry on top” moment will have been left with a bitter taste in their mouths.
Gray has ended up watering down her conclusion by acknowledging the changes that have already been made to the unwieldy operation at No10.
Not only had the best photograph, of Boris toasting staff at Lee Cain’s leaving do, already been widely circulated but, in reality, the images only served to corroborate Downing Street’s repeated suggestions that the boss was only there in passing, red box in hand. The report speaks to Mr Johnson popping in on events for 10 minutes here, 20 minutes there: hardly the party animal Labour has been making him out to be.
Martin Reynolds doesn’t come out well, having apparently ignored Mr Cain’s advice to cancel the “bring your own bottle” garden party on May 20, 2020. But both have already moved on. It will surprise no one that the inquiry could not find any evidence of Dominic Cummings’s claim that he also warned Reynolds in writing against holding the gathering.
It had been suggested that Simon Case would end up being the fall guy, but as the Cabinet Secretary’s name is only mentioned three times in passing, and he didn’t even receive a Metropolitan Police fine, he seems an unlikely scapegoat.
So Teflon Johnson lives to fight another day, although I doubt the Standards Committee investigation into whether he lied to parliament will prove as much of a cakewalk.
Juliet Samuels The Met took the pressure off
We did not learn much that was new from Sue Gray’s momentous report, except that the Prime Minister appears to have restricted himself to salad at his own surprise birthday “party” instead of tackling the tempting, but more fattening, M&S sandwiches on the Cabinet table. Is this the modern version of a Profumo moment?
Still, there is one dynamic alluded to in Ms Gray’s text that should intrigue us: the way her investigation interacted with one carried out by the Metropolitan Police. If you recall, the Met was initially reluctant to tackle partygate because it broke with its policy of not retrospectively investigating lockdown breaches. Yet it was precisely at the moment of maximum pressure for the Prime Minister in January of this year that the Met changed its mind. At the time, this was extremely helpful to No10: it immediately put Ms Gray’s investigation on hold and thereby dissipated the head of steam building up behind a Tory rebellion against him.
And, we now know from Ms Gray’s report, it also prompted her to stop investigating several lockdown breaches on the grounds that the Met’s inquiry “had primacy”. One of those included a gathering in Boris Johnson’s own flat in November 2020.
In the end, the Met disappointed Boris’s critics by issuing him with just one fine for the M&S sandwich party. Again, this was helpful. And this had another curious effect. Ms Gray reports that the Met’s decision prompted her to abandon further investigation and evidence-gathering, including into the No 10 flat event, because “it was not appropriate or proportionate” to continue.
In short, reading Ms Gray’s account, it is hard to escape the feeling that, at every turn, the Met took the decision that wound up most reducing pressure on the Prime Minister. I wonder if Mr Johnson has any idea of why that is.
iain Dale The mistreatment of cleaners was shameful
Perhaps the most damning section of the Sue Gray report was this: “I was made aware of multiple examples of a lack of respect and poor treatment of security and cleaning staff. This was unacceptable.” Too damn right it was.
While no one is accusing the Prime Minister himself of behaving in this reprehensible manner [and nor should they – he doesn’t], no one in Downing Street would have behaved in this way under Margaret Thatcher. They wouldn’t have dared.
However, let’s be honest and admit that this behaviour is sadly commonplace in workplaces up and down the country.
As Sue Gray points out, steps have been taken to change the culture in Downing Street since these events happened. However, too many people who were responsible for the bad behaviour remain. It is to be hoped that the appointment of David Canzini as deputy chief of staff in February will have done much to change the culture inside No 10. He’s a total professional and won’t stand for the kind of behaviour we read about in Ms Gray’s report.
The country won’t stand for any more of it, either.
As for Johnson’s premiership, the Gray report is not going to end it. There was precious little in it that we didn’t know before, and so far as I can see, very little that will provoke Conservative MPS to send letters of no confidence in the Prime Minister to Sir Graham Brady.
The “greased piglet” escapes once again. Until the next time.
Janet Daley
This isn’t over for the Prime Minister
Only days ago we thought it was all over. It isn’t now. The photographs that have gone into the public domain and the detail in which the history is recounted in the Sue Gray report have turned this into a much uglier story. The sentence that seems to say it all is a quote from Martin Reynolds, a principal member of the Prime Minister’s staff, in which he comments to colleagues of a now notorious drinks event at Downing Street that “we seem to have got away with [it]”.
Is this how you would describe a gathering that you genuinely believed to be blameless and within the rules that you were responsible for introducing?
The more lurid details of the prevailing drinking culture in Downing Street might be unsavoury – suggesting as they do a culture of shambolic irresponsibility – but they are not themselves a resigning matter.
Indeed, much of the behaviour that is recounted here can simply be seen as insensitive or, if you are inclined to make harsher judgments, you might say, callous, arrogant and puerile. But the significant constitutional question, quite apart from the law-breaking, is whether Boris Johnson misled the House when he categorically denied knowledge of rule-breaking parties.
He has reiterated now that he believed that to be true. In which case, he did not understand (or care) what the law, which he had enacted, actually meant.
He seems to be having difficulty generally with the meaning of words. He has told Parliament that he accepts full responsibility for his failings.
What exactly does that mean if it has no practical consequences?
Johnson takes “full responsibility for everything that took place on my watch” but at the same time, he was not aware of what went on at those parties after he left. Those two statements are contradictory.
Being fully responsible for everything that happened on your watch does not mean that you can escape the consequences when you have your back turned. This is not over.
nick Timothy Tory MPS will go down with Johnson if they don’t oust him
Many ask how Boris Johnson gets away with it. In truth, he has no magic power, nor conspicuous luck. His secret is shamelessness, an understanding that if he disrespects standards most people try to uphold – like telling the truth – few have the bravery to confront him. It is no wonder he acts in this way. It is the lesson of his life.
The response to the Sue Gray report was flat. Not because its content was not shocking, but because expectations have been lowered slowly by a series of cynical manoeuvres: briefings against Ms Gray, disinformation about key details, and the use of the report and the police investigation to avoid legitimate questions for months about the PM’S conduct. If the report had been published in January, Johnson would have been in far greater danger.
It is odd that Ms Gray did not investigate the party Johnson attended in the Downing Street flat. Nonetheless, her report is damning enough. We know the rule-breakers covered their actions because they understood they were doing wrong.
And Johnson not only broke the rules he imposed on the country, he lied about doing so. Even now, his supposed contrition gives way to conceit. Rules he once presented as vital he writes off as trivial.
Such dishonesty will one day prompt a reckoning. Tory MPS must decide if that reckoning comes now or at the hands of the electorate later. But if they choose to delay, many will go down with the PM.
‘The final version of the report felt a bit like being presented with a birthday cake with some of the slices already eaten’