Downing Street: UK PM Johnson faces backlash over Christmas lockdown party

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LONDON, Dec 8 (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Boris Johnson faced a backlash on Wednesday after a video surfaced showing his staff laughing and joking over how to explain a gathering in Downing Street during a Christmas Covid-19 lockdown last year when such festivities were banned.

Johnson and his ministers have repeatedly denied any rules were broken by the gatherings in late 2020, though the Mirror newspaper said Johnson spoke at a leaving party and that his team had a wine-fuelled gathering of around 40 to 50 people.

Stratton, standing before British flags at an official Downing Street lectern, chuckles and says: “I went home.” She then laughs and smiles.A Downing Street spokeswoman declined comment. Nearly 146,000 people have died from COVID in the United Kingdom and Johnson is weighing up whether to impose tougher restrictions after the discovery of the new Omicron coronavirus variant.

The leader of the opposition Labour Party, Keir Starmer, said the video was an insult to those who had followed lockdown rules when it meant being separated from their families over Christmas.

 

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