Boris Johnson will be questioned by MPs next Wednesday as part of the partygate investigation into whether he misled parliament when he was prime minister.
Mr Johnson has accepted the Privileges Committee’s invitation to give oral evidence to them from 2pm on 22 March, the committee confirmed.
The session will be held in public and Mr Johnson will face questions from the committee, which is comprised of four Tory MPs, two Labour – including chair Harriet Harman – and one SNP MP.
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His appearance will come two and a half weeks after the committee released a preliminary report after they were tasked with investigating whether Mr Johnson misled parliament over partygate allegations.
Mr Johnson repeatedly denied COVID lockdown rules were broken at Number 10 when asked in the Commons, but the report said evidence strongly suggests it would have been “obvious” to him rules were being breached.
The former PM had requested the evidence before he appeared in front of the committee to provide his own oral evidence.
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He has been invited to provide written evidence ahead of the session as well, with any response to be published.
If Mr Johnson is found to have misled parliament he could be suspended from the Commons for 10 days, which could trigger a recall petition.
If 10% of voters in his Uxbridge constituency sign a petition he could lose his job as an MP as a by-election would have to take place – although he could run in it.
On 3 March, the committee published the evidence it has obtained so far in its initial 24-page report, including four previously unseen photos of Downing Street gatherings awash with bottles of alcohol.
It said the Commons may have been misled multiple times, which would be contempt of parliament.
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The committee also laid out in the preliminary report what it will ask Mr Johnson when he appears in front of them.
The report said: “The evidence strongly suggests that breaches of guidance would have been obvious to Mr Johnson at the time he was at the gatherings.
“There is evidence that those who were advising Mr Johnson about what to say to the press and in the House were themselves struggling to contend that some gatherings were within the rules.”
