Sir Keir Starmer today refused to offer any further details on a ‘work’ event during which he drank beer with colleagues, as he again insisted there had been no breach of Covid rules.
The Labour leader is facing calls to provide evidence to back up his claims that an event on 30 April last year was in line with Coronavirus restrictions at the time.
Sir Keir was filmed swigging a beer in a room with others at Durham Miners Hall at 10.04pm that Friday night.
But he has repeatedly stressed he was working on the night in question, which came in the week before council elections and the Hartlepool by-election.
The Labour leader has also maintained he and his team had only stopped for a ‘break’ before resuming their duties.
It has since been revealed that Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner was also at the event.
Labour previously denied that she was present, but the party now say that was a ‘mistake’ made in ‘good faith’.
At the time of the event, England was in the ‘Step 2’ rules that banned people from gathering indoors with people not from your own household.
However, there was an exemption for ‘work purposes’.
Sir Keir again faced questions about the event on a visit to Worthing today, as he continued Labour’s campaigning ahead of Thursday’s local elections.
Asked if he had really gone back to work after 10pm that night, the Labour leader said: ‘We were working, it was days before the election.
‘We paused for something to eat, there was no party, no rules were broken – there’s nothing I can add to that.’
Sir Keir was also grilled on suggestions there could have been as many as 30 attendees.
A delivery driver for an Indian restaurant yesterday claimed that he had dropped off ‘quite a big order’ at the hall of ‘about four bags’ of curry, rice and naan bread.
He also estimated there were ‘probably about 30 or so’ people there.
But after the Daily Mail made further enquires with the restaurant, he changed his story to say he had no recollection of making the delivery on April 30.
Asked today to give further clarification about what happened on the night in question, Sir Keir insisted he had ‘nothing to add’.
‘There was no party, no breach of the rules,’ he told broadcasters.
Sir Keir Starmer again faced questions about the ‘Beergate’ event on a visit to Worthing today, as he continued Labour’s campaigning ahead of Thursday’s local elections
The Labour leader was filmed swigging a beer in a room with others at Durham Miners Hall at 10.04pm on 30 April last year
The Labour leader accused the Conservatives – ahead of this week’s local elections, – of ‘desperately trying to talk about anything other than the cost of living, chucking as much mud as possible’.
‘If they spent as much energy and as much focus on people’s bills and the tax they’re whacking people for, then millions people would actually be grateful for that,’ he added.
‘I think this is classic, two or three days before an election, mud-slinging from the Tories. But, I’ve got nothing to add.’
Sir Keir has called for both Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak to resign over the Partygate scandal, which has seen both the Prime Minister and Chancellor hit with police fines for attending a birthday bash for Mr Johnson in Number 10 in June 2020.
Some Tory MPs have since questioned why the Metropolitan Police investigation into lockdown breaches in Downing Street isn’t being replicated over Sir Keir’s ‘Beergate’ event.
In February, Durham Constabulary decided not to launch a formal probe after reviewing a video of the event and deciding it did not believe an offence had been ‘established’.
Sir Keir today took a selfie with two runners on Worthing sea front as he campaigned in the town ahead of Thursday’s local elections
The Labour leader spoke with Labour councillor Beccy Cooper during his campaign visit in East Sussex
But Sir Keir’s time on the south coast was dogged by questions about the event at Durham Miners Hall
Richard Holden, the Tory MP for North West Durham, wrote to the force a week ago asking them to reconsider in light of Scotland Yard’s decision to fine Mr Johnson.
Last night he sent a further letter asking officers to look into Sir Keir’s ‘implausible’ account.
He wrote: ‘Keir Starmer has again repeated his claim that he returned to work after being pictured drinking beer inside after 10pm on the evening in question.
‘As many observers – including residents of County Durham – now know, this seems implausible.’
Mr Holden added that it ‘simply cannot be the case that Keir Starmer returned to work’, or that the drink was ‘reasonably necessary for work purposes’.
He also demanded that police interview two students who filmed the video of Sir Keir swigging beer.
