Downing Street launches inquiry into Boris Johnson’s leaked texts with Sir James Dyson
Downing Street is launching an inquiry into how Boris Johnson’s personal text messages with one of the UK’s richest men were leaked to the BBC.
It was revealed yesterday that Sir James Dyson had lobbied Johnson for his staff to get tax exemptions for their work in building ventilators during the start of the Covid pandemic last year.
The text messages showed that Johnson said he would “fix” the issue to ensure the vacuum tycoon could help with the UK’s Covid effort.
It is believed that the messages were shared to a small group of senior Downing Street aides last year.
The Prime Minister’s spokesman today said the Cabinet Office would launch an inquiry into how Johnson’s texts were leaked to the media, after he said yesterday there would be no probe into the leak.
It comes after Johnson’s personal messages with Saudi Arabia Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman were leaked last week.
“I can confirm that, yes, we have instructed the Cabinet Office to look into this,” the spokesman said.
“The position has changed from yesterday – it was correct at the time yesterday but, as usual, we keep things under review and we have now decided to undertake this internal inquiry.
“As you would expect, we continually look at this and the position we decided today is that we want to make sure we have this internal inquiry into that.”
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer hit out at the text messages in Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) yesterday, saying Johnson’s government embodied “sleaze, sleaze, sleaze”.
Johnson defended the text messages, saying any Prime Minister would “shift heaven and earth” to “secure ventilators for the people of this country” last March as the coronavirus crisis swept the globe.
It comes as it was revealed by the Telegraph today that Dyson had moved back to the UK, after moving to Singapore, a tax haven, two years ago.