Page:Fifth Report - Matter referred on 21 April 2022 (conduct of Rt Hon Boris Johnson).pdf/94

 whether they themselves had given assurances to Mr Johnson and none of them other than Mr Doyle and Mr Slack stated that they had personally given such assurances.

5. Furthermore, the Committee finds that I intended my assurances to be “overarching and comprehensive”. Not only is this the opposite of what I said, it ignores completely the fact that, in the very next breath, I announced an independent investigation. "Committee comment: The Committee is entitled to consider what members of the House and the public would have understood Mr Johnson to have said and what he meant by those words. The Committee also concluded that using an announcement about an independent investigation was a deliberate avoidance of his own knowledge."

6. Finally, the Committee finds that I “scaled down” what I meant by “repeatedly” and that “the only assurances that can… be said to have been given with certainty” were those from Jack Doyle and James Slack. However, it is the Committee that has scaled down what I said to fit its own conclusion by ignoring the sworn evidence of Sarah Dines MP, Andrew Griffith MP and Jack Doyle, corroborating my own evidence under oath, that I received additional assurances in meetings. There is no explanation for why their evidence is disregarded. The Committee supports its position by selectively and misleadingly quoting from correspondence. In a letter of 27 March my lawyers wrote:

''“…Mr Johnson thought of an official who was in the morning meetings referred to by Andrew Griffith MP and Sarah Dines MP in their evidence to the Committee. However, he did not say that he knew precisely who was in each meeting and who specifically gave him the assurances remembered by the MPs.''

'' On reflection, Mr Johnson is still not sure of these matters and does not wish to speculate. The Committee has evidence from Jack Doyle, Andrew Griffith MP and Sarah Dines MP that Mr Johnson was provided with assurances about the event on 18 December 2020 by officials at these meetings. Therefore, irrespective of the identities of those officials, there can be no dispute that (i) assurances were received from Jack Doyle and James Slack; (ii) three witnesses have given evidence that Mr Johnson received assurances in at least one of the PMQ prep meetings; and (iii) Mr Johnson was given assurances by more than one person and on more than one occasion.''

"Committee comment: The Committee has not disregarded the evidence of Sarah Dines MP and Andrew Griffith MP. Their evidence is limited and without the particulars that Mr Johnson failed to provide is insufficient to counter the consistent evidence that no additional assurances were given by anyone. In any event in oral evidence when pressed about whether the Committee should pursue the evidence of Ms Dines and Mr Griffith, Mr Johnson himself said it was “probably totally irrelevant”."

7. In its document, the Committee has quoted only the underlined passage and presented it as if it applied to whether I recalled being given assurances in meetings at all. This is grossly misleading. As the full quote makes clear, I was not sure about who gave me the assurances in the meetings, but that they were given was never in doubt. It assists the Committee in its ‘misleading impression’ argument to find that I only received assurances from two advisers, but that is a complete denial of the evidence.