Former attorney general becomes latest Tory MP to call for PM to quit

Former Attorney General Jeremy Wright has become the latest Conservative MP to call for Prime Minister Boris Johnson to resign.

Mr Wright said the controversy over lockdown parties in Downing Street had done "lasting damage" to the party.

The scale of Covid rule-breaking within government was laid bare in a report by senior official Sue Gray last week.

Nine Tory MPs have publicly urged the PM to quit since it was published, bringing the total number to 25.

It is not known how many of these have submitted letters of no confidence in the PM, although others could have done so without making their views public.

Only Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee of backbench Tory MPs, knows the exact number, and he is not expected to say anything until he has received 54 letters. That is the threshold that needs to be reached to trigger a confidence vote.

Mr Wright, who was attorney general under former Conservative prime ministers David Cameron and Theresa May, is among the most senior Conservatives to break ranks with Mr Johnson.

In a statement on his website, the Conservative MP said that the controversy around gatherings in Downing Street and Whitehall while Covid restrictions were in place "have done real and lasting damage to the reputation not just of this Government but to the institutions and authority of government more generally".

Mr Wright went on to say: "Putting that right matters hugely to the essence of government authority and to the effectiveness of government policy, and I cannot see that the moving on of civil servants or apologies, however heartfelt, will succeed in doing so."

Mr Wright said that "for the good of this and future governments, the prime minister should resign".

The long-awaited report by Ms Gray detailed examples of excessive drinking, mistreatment of cleaners and security staff, and repeated Covid rule-breaking during the pandemic.

Ms Gray's report followed the conclusion of a separate Metropolitan Police investigation into 12 lockdown parties in Downing Street and on other government offices.

The force handed out 126 fixed penalty notices for rule breaches, with the prime minister receiving a single fine for attending a birthday party in the Cabinet Room in June 2020.

In Parliament last week, Mr Johnson said he took "full responsibility for everything that took place on my watch".

He told MPs that when he had previously said "the rules and guidance had been followed at all times", it had been "what I believed to be true".

He said he had also apologised personally to Downing Street cleaners and custodians for the "unacceptable" behaviour of some of his officials.