If anyone was still in any doubt about the breathtaking arrogance at the heart of the UK Government during the long months of Covid lockdown, and the subsequent Partygate investigation, it has now been laid bare.
As families up and down the land suffered while sticking to the letter of emergency Covid laws, the governing elite in Downing Street did the opposite.
They partied, and then some.
More than 50 fines have now been handed out by the Met Police in relation to the Partygate probe into Covid rule-breaking in Whitehall.
And the recipients include Chancellor Rishi Sunak and Prime Minister Boris Johnson himself.
While exact details have not been disclosed, the picture painted by the police investigation and the Sue Gray report before it is a shameful one.
As captain of the ship, Boris Johnson is ultimately responsible for what went on.
This newspaper has previously called for the Prime Minister to resign, following his credulity-defying explanation when questioned about this subject in January.
Johnson’s actions in allowing – and, staggeringly, participating in – Covid breaches on his watch are those of a man disconnected from the people he contends to be privileged to serve.
Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak have broken the law and repeatedly lied to the British public.
They must both resign.
The Conservatives are totally unfit to govern. Britain deserves better.
— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) April 12, 2022
In the face of incredible pressure to resign in the past, the Prime Minister has stood his ground.
But it is difficult to see how his position – and that of Chancellor Sunak – can remain tenable given both have been found to have broken the laws they shaped.
The same argument can be made for the peripheral figures in the Partygate scandal: the senior politicians and civil servants whose job it was to guide this country through this terrible pandemic in a calm and considered way.
Sadly, they chose to take liberties while restricting the liberty of millions of decent citizens throughout the country.
In doing so they lost any moral authority they might once have had.
