PAY TO PARTY

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson Hit With Fines for COVID Parties

He said he has already paid his fine and now wants to “get on and deliver on the mandate that I have.”

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his finance minister were fined Tuesday for hosting parties when the U.K. was under a strict COVID-19 lockdown. A Downing Street spokesman confirmed that police had fined the two politicians and given Johnson’s wife a penalty notice. Johnson confirmed separately that he has already paid his fine, offering a “full apology” but saying he now wants to “get on and deliver on the mandate that I have,” Sky News reports. The Metropolitan Police launched an investigation last year after it was informed Johnson hosted birthday parties for himself in June 2020, right in the middle of early COVID lockdowns. The party sparked furor in the U.K., with some urging him to resign. Police said they have issued more than 50 fines connected to the parties. “The fact that the prime minister and his chancellor then lied about it, and would have continued to do so if the police hadn’t intervened, is truly shameless,” a spokesperson for the COVID Bereaved Families told the BBC. “They broke the law. But even worse, they took us all for mugs.”