The media is fulminating with faux anger and doing its best to whip people up into a frezy over #BYOBGate, when the PM allegedly attended drinks (with crisps and sausage rolls) in the Number 10 garden on 20 May 2020.
Whilst Twitter is going apeshit over this, it is worth remembering that Downing Street is an office to hundreds of advisers and civil servants, and a home to the PM, chancellor and their families. Those who live in No. 10 or No. 11 had a right to use their own garden during lockdown. Work and meetings often took place in the garden throughout the day and well into the evening.
This is not the same as a group of people turning up at someone else's house/garden for a piss up.
That being said, there are a number of points that people need to consider:
1 The optics of this are terrible, anyone with half a political brain could see that this was a bad idea invite people (socially distanced or not) by email (ie provide a written trail of pre planning). Whoever authorised/organised this needs a sound kicking.
2 The fact that the email was sent to 100 people pretty well guarantees that this would leak. Whoever authorised/organised this should have known that.
3 Why has the media.leaker(s) sat on this for 20 months? This is clearly a coordinated attempt by certain people to undermine the government and get rid of Boris.
4 The ITV journalist, Paul Brand, to whom this email (and other partygate type stories) was leaked is married to Joe Cuddeford who (by happenstance) is the Deputy Director at The Cabinet Office.
5 Oddly, ITV have redacted the date on the email. Why?
6 Bournemouth on the day of #BYOBGate
No comments:
Post a Comment