72. In his oral evidence Mr Johnson disputed the number of people at the gathering. We received evidence that “certainly more than 20” people were present.[1] Mr Johnson urged us to take account of the conclusions of the Sue Gray report which referred to “15 to 20 people” being present. He also drew attention to a No. 10 official’s evidence in which that witness stated that Mr Johnson’s speech at the event was very brief: he spoke for “[a]pproximately 45 seconds. Then I said something for about 15 seconds.”[2] Asked to say whether he accepted the evidence of some witnesses that there was insufficient social distancing at the event, Mr Johnson replied, “I say that some of them do, some of them don’t”.[3]
73. We conclude that Mr Johnson attended an impromptu event in the Press Office vestibule on 27 November 2020 at which there is evidence from some attendees that social distancing was not observed. One witness stated that there were “certainly more than 20” people in attendance. Another stated that Mr Johnson made a joke about the lack of social distancing. Mr Johnson draws attention to the Second Permanent Secretary’s conclusion that “15 to 20 people” were present. There is not a large gap between the two estimates and clearly no-one was taking an exact count of numbers. Even if it were at the lower estimate of 15, that was too many for social distancing of 1 metre, let alone 2 metres, in that space. We note further evidence that there was a large gathering of people in the vestibule, sufficient to make it difficult for a person to make their way through the room.
74. Mr Johnson stated that he was in attendance for about 10 minutes. This would have afforded him opportunity to observe a large gathering of people in the relatively small space of the vestibule. We have received no evidence that significant mitigations or efforts to maintain social distancing were in place at the event. We have noted earlier (see paragraphs 37 and 66) our conclusion that no reasonable reading of the Covid Guidance at the time would have considered a socially undistanced event purely for the purpose of maintaining staff morale permissible.
- ↑ See paragraph 68 above.
- ↑ Additional evidence materials, p8; for the material in the Sue Gray report referred to by Mr Johnson, see GOV.UK, Findings of the Second Permanent Secretary’s Investigation into alleged gatherings on government premises during Covid restrictions, 25 May 2022, p19
- ↑ Q49
