Big Dog takes responsibility!

After our Prime Minister gave a lame apology in Parliament on Wednesday (in which he claimed he thought a drinks party was work and apologised for the hurt the news stories were causing whilst claiming he had personally done nothing wrong) the revelations have continued to flow

One of the defining images of he pandemic was of the Queen conforming to the social distancing rules and sitting alone at the funeral of Prince Philip. That made it even more shocking when it was revealed that on the eve of the funeral TWO parties were held in No.10 apparently contravening covid regulations. This has prompted an unprecedented apology to the Queen from No 10.

Then yesterday the Daily Mirror reported that events in No 10 became so regular they were dubbed "wine-time Fridays" and staff bought a drinks fridge to store their alcohol. The paper claims that Boris Johnson attended a "handful" of the events at a time when indoor socialising was banned.

To date the count of Whitehall parties has reached 13

With opinion polls showing 70% of the British people thinking Mr Johnson should resign, The Independent reports that No 10 is springing into action. They have launched "Operation save big dog"!!! The plan (so named, it is claimed, by our Prime Minister) seems to consist of a number of actions to save the Prime Minister his job

Elements are said to include

* A communications plan to get ministers on air talking about the Prime Ministers ( few) successes

* Identifying political and civil servants who should lose their jobs to protect that of Mr Johnson to show something is being done

* Spinning the report from Civil Servant Sue Gray to show the Prime Minister is NOT responsible for the whole mess

It looks like our Prime Minister is to take real responsibility if only on a plan to keep him in office!

You can read the full report here

The hope is that the Sue Grey report will report facts and events but not ascribe blame . It has to be remembered Ms Grey is a career Civil Servant whose future preferment is dependent on political support. She has no legal powers to force disclosure of evidence etc Previous such civil servant investigations eg of Mr Blair over the Iraq war illustrate how unlikely it is she will ascribe blame to the Prime Minister, her role is to be apolitical : hence the plan

As attempts are made to spread the blame in the coming days always remember that old adage "A Fish Rots from the Head Down".