A real rout. According to Guardian (link in English), a total of 44 members of the British government had resigned, Wednesday, July 6 at the end of the evening, tired of the repeated scandals involving the executive.
Five secretaries of state announced in a joint letter that they were leaving Boris Johnson’s government together on Wednesday. “We must ask that, for the good of the party and the country, you step down”wrote to the British Prime Minister the Secretaries of State Kemi Badenoch, Neil O’Brien, Alex Burghart, Lee Rowley and Julia Lopez.
Several senior ministers, including the loyal ones, have also asked him to resign as the situation has become untenable, according to British media. Among the names cited, Interior Minister Priti Patel, or Nadhim Zahawi, less than 24 hours after his appointment as Minister of Finance.
Boris Johnson rejected those calls for the resignation on Wednesday. “We will continue with the government of this country”, affirmed the Prime Minister in the afternoon facing the heads of the parliamentary committees. The manager claimed that the “colossal mandate” which had been entrusted to him by the voters in 2019 conferred on him the duty of “Continue”.
Already considerably weakened by the Downing Street party scandal during the pandemic, Boris Johnson survived a vote of no confidence from his own camp a few weeks ago. Health Minister Sajid Javid and Finance Minister Rishi Sunak were the first to leave on Tuesday evening, announcing their resignation a few minutes apart, tired of the repeated scandals that have rocked the government for months. . The British have a right to expect “of integrity on the part of their government”said Sajid Javid in particular.
>> United Kingdom: “Partygate”, sex scandals … These repeated cases that shake the government of Boris Johnson
The Prime Minister had just apologized after yet another scandal, acknowledging having made a “mistake” by appointing in February in his government Chris Pincher, in charge of the parliamentary discipline of the conservative deputies. The latter resigned last week after being accused of touching two men. After claiming the opposite, Downing Street admitted that the Prime Minister had been informed as early as 2019 of old accusations against Chris Pincher but that he had them “forgotten” by naming it.
There have been several cases of a sexual nature in Parliament: a deputy suspected of rape was arrested and then released on bail in mid-May, another resigned in April for having viewed pornographic videos in Parliament on his mobile phone and a former deputy has was sentenced in May to 18 months in prison for the sexual assault of a 15-year-old boy.