Boris Johnson has blasted the Privileges Committee as “beneath contempt” because it had reached a “deranged conclusion” to deliver “what is intended to be the final knife-thrust in a protracted political assassination”. In a damning verdict the committee said that the former prime minister Boris Johnson would have faced a recommended suspension of 90 days from the Commons for deliberately misleading MPs and “being complicit in the campaign of abuse and attempted intimidation” of the Privileges Committee, had he not quit his seat in protest.
The Privileges Committee’s recommended suspension for acts, including deliberately misleading MPs, would have paved the way for a by-election for the former prime minister if he had not resigned in anticipation. Mr Johnson quit the Commons last week after reading the report’s findings, meaning he will escape the immediate prospect of a sanction.
The recommended suspension far exceeded the 10-day threshold which, if approved by the wider House of Commons, could have led to a by-election in his Uxbridge and South Ruislip constituency.
