Boris stands down as MP with immediate effect part 2

[IClaudine]

New thread!

Johnson says what some people would like to but daren't

Yes, I think that is spot on. All the stuff about pillar boxes and the other racist and homophobic comments reflect the views of a certain percentage of the population. Sad but true.

He is now a columnist for the DM, small problem is that he hasn't applied for advice from ACOBA.

Sue Gray ring a bell?

Every PM and MP in history has stood up and told lies in the commons 😂

Dont see why it makes much difference when its Bojo

People suffered during the pandemic. Some horrifically. Some people's lives will never be the same again. If you find Johnson's rule breaking during the pandemic and then lying about it a laugh, well that says a lot about you.

Reminds me of something I saw yesterday, saying that what's doing for Johnson isn't just the lies, but the fact that he's managed to make his lies the focus of so much grief and anger about our suffering during the pandemic.

I think that's a very accurate summation

Agreed.

@ChezzD that is a statement which demands evidence. Please be so good as to provide it. Thank you.

Agreed. It's shameful that he was ever in a position to lead our country.

Because we cannot hold habitual liars in high regard.

No definitely not, he was making the rules, if he cannot keep them, regardless of the extent, what Starmer did or didn't do, is irrelevant, he isn't the PM.

Farmers who breach bio security for bird flu have been fined '000s, not a £100 FPN.

Did anyone watch News night last night. It was heartbreaking. A mother was talking about her 14 year old son who died of leukemia during lockdown. She was allowed to be with him in his final few weeks. His dad wasn't allowed until the hospital relented in his final days. His brother wasn't allowed to be with him at all. (I'm crying again writing that)

And while they were following the rules Johnson was pissing it up and treating taking the absolute piss out of the public. How anyone can defend him is beyond me.

Farmers who breach bio security for bird flu have been fined '000s, not a £100 FPN. I really don't understand your point. Farmers who break bio security laws should be heavily fined.

He was found to have -
Deliberately lied in Parliament;
Deliberately lied to the Committee;
Breached confidentiality by leaking parts of the report;
Impugned the committee and therefore Parliamentary process; and
Was complicit in the campaign of abuse and attempted intimidation of the committee.

This wasn't simply standing near an existing hospital claiming it was brand new.

Quite.

Whether individuals broke the rules or not, and whether or not the rules were good, is pretty immaterial.

If you're the leader who sets those rules, then you damn well ought to do your best to abide by them and enforce them in your immediate vicinity, or else you're a hypocrite.

And if you're the leader of a people who've been through a massive collective trauma, you ought to have the humility to accept the standards imposed on you by your office as a public servant.

People in the street might have broken the odd rule. They didn't lie to parliament about it.

"We didn't practice what we preached, we are ashamed, and we are sorry."

Words that Johnson would choke on.

That's why I don't like him.

I think people forget some of us thought he'd be good for the country lord knows why! And I liked levelling up as a policy and that he was keen to move brexit on (despite being remain I believe in democracy)

I didn't like not going to cobra meetings at the start of LD but actually respected that as a libertarian he did chose LD eventually.

But the lies. Nope. That's it for me. Not even a slight white lie - can make my leave with those.

But having gatherings and wine time Fridays and pretending all rules were followed whilst people couldn't even attend funerals turned my stomach.

A witch hunt can only happen if there's prey. He handed himself to that on a plate.

John Major and the Maastricht Treaty, Tony Blair on the Iraq War, thats just for starters.😂

You've heard of the Iraq Inquiry? Bit more formal than an internal Parliamentary committee. Produced 12 volumes of evidence & reports.

So that makes what Johnson did OK? What an odd argument 😂

Thanks to @ChezzD I was curious to see what Johnson about Iraq. This article is hilariously ironic. The double standards are many. There is even a fridge reference!😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/may/06/boris-johnson-eel-like-tony-blair-iraq-war

Agree! Well said. And people will defend him because they're defending themselves too.

Asked whether he would ever be prime minister,he said: "Of course not," adding: "The chance[s] of me being prime minister are about as big as the chances of me being locked in a disused fridge interred in a … what is it?"

Oh i see, so spreading a disease that has killed over 200k people is a small transgression is it...

You said but the initial FPN for a 'party' was ludicrous. I suppose we should feel grateful that we live in a country where small transgressions like this are taken so seriously

Johnson was having full on gatherings, involving many people from outside of his work place, these people then went back into their social circles etc helping to spread Covid to the most vulnerable, like my partners Nan who died of it.

But farmers should be heavily fined....

Thats my point

It doesn’t sound like there’s much point trying to explain much to you tbh. Your standards are clearly very, very low.

The thing is that even taking that argument at its very highest, this is still Johnson's own fault for being stupid and arrogant.

Covid was a very specific experience, in a huge variety of ways. The very large majority of us have never lived through a period of such turmoil, nor of the government having such an impact on our lives. Meaning that people care more. There had also been a great deal of suffering due to both the virus and the way we managed it. This is all exceptionally obvious, and he'll have known it when he made the decision to double down and lie rather than come clean.

And ultimately, he's only reaping these consequences because he's now so disgraced. If people didn't hate him so much because of his actions, his party would be much less willing to hang him out to dry. He might have a chance of the Commons refusing to accept the committee verdict, because self-interest for Tory MPs would look different. He'd also have the option of standing in the byelection and winning the seat again. But obviously he can't because, as previously mentioned, people hate him. And he did this to himself.