Boris Johnson’s resignation honours list has been published, with rewards for key allies, including Priti Patel and Jacob Rees-Mogg.
Former secretaries of states Simon Clarke and Mr Rees-Mogg were given knighthoods, while Priti Patel was made a dame.
Tees Valley Mayor Benjamin Houchen and London Assembly member Shaun Bailey are among seven nominations for peerages.
Former minister Nadine Dorries was not put forward for the House of Lords.
She stood down as an MP “with immediate effect” an hour before the honours list was released.
Honours from the man who doesn’t know the meaning of the word “honourable” - the man who has made a career out of lying; the man who brought the office of Prime Minister into disrepute, by acquiring a police record while in office; the man who may yet be found guilty of misleading parliament over ‘partygate’ allegations.
Conservative politician Shaun Bailey has stood down as chair of the London Assembly’s police and crime committee after it was revealed he’d breached Covid lockdown protocols.
It was revealed this week that Bailey had attended a Christmas party at the Conservative Campaign Headquarters in December 2020. At the time, London was under Tier 2 restrictions, which barred household mixing.
The former prime minister’s highly anticipated resignation honours list has been published and includes Martin Reynolds, his former principal private secretary, who later earned the nickname “party Marty” for his role in a “bring your own booze” party during the pandemic.
Mr Johnson also gave a CBE to Jack Doyle, his former director of communications, and a peerage to his chief of staff Dan Rosenfield, both of whom were in office during much of the partygate rule-breaking era.
Other aides to get honours include the former communications director Guto Harri, who has launched a tell-all podcast about his time in Number 10, parliament hairdresser Kelly-Jo Dodge and Sarah Vaughan Brown, a former personal adviser to Mr Johnson’s wife Carrie.
Sarah Vaughan-Brown, formerly personal adviser to Johnson’s third-wife Carrie, was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire for her political and public service.
The 48-year-old’s role included walking the couple’s four-legged pet Dilyn.
The House of Lords Appointments Commission (HOLAC) has confirmed it rejected eight of the former prime minister’s nominations.
Mr Sunak said Mr Johnson asked him to override their recommendations, or “make promises to people”.
But he said he refused, adding it was “something I wasn’t prepared to do”.
The intervention marks a new point in an escalating war of words over Mr Johnson’s controversial resignation honours list.
Downing Street has insisted that Mr Sunak passed on Mr Johnson’s list of nominations unaltered. It says it also accepted HOLAC’s full approved list and passed it to the King.
But on Monday, a source describing themselves as an ally of Mr Johnson accused the prime minister of “secretly” blocking peerages for “Nadine and others”.
Now politically powerless, BJ still thinks he can do as he likes …
At 29, Charlotte Owen, Boris Johnson’s ex-aide, is set to become the youngest ever life peer following her inclusion on the former prime minister’s honours list.
Ms Owen will now become Baroness Owen, but what kind of political career has earned her the honour?
Charlotte Tranter Owen, born in 1993, graduated from the University of York in 2015. She gained a 2:1 in Politics and International Relations.
According to her LinkedIn page, she worked as an intern for strategic communications consultancy Portland, before working as a constituency intern for Tory MP William Wragg for one month. For six months, Ms Owen worked as a parliamentary intern to Boris Johnson, before becoming a parliamentary assistant to Alok Sharma for seven months. For a year and nine months after this, she was a senior parliamentary assistant to Jake Berry and Mr Johnson, before exclusively working for Mr Johnson for a year and two months. From February 2021 to October 2022, Ms Owen was a special adviser to both Mr Johnson and Liz Truss during her short tenure as PM. In this role, when Mr Johnson was in office, she worked half of the time for him and the other half for the chief whip and parliamentary secretary to the treasury, Chris Heaton-Harris.
Her time working in parliament, after being granted a peerage, therefore totals around five years and eight months.
Five years surely comes close to a life time of dedicated service and certainly will give this Ms Owen the sort of breadth and depth of experience that is sought in upper chamber. No?
A video has emerged showing some Conservative Party workers drinking and dancing at a Christmas party during the Covid pandemic.
In the video, published by the Mirror website, one person can be heard saying: “As long as we don’t stream that we’re, like, bending the rules.”
The paper says the video sheds new light on a party that police had previously looked into.
The Conservatives said disciplinary action had already been taken.
Police investigated the event last year and no fines were issued.
Shaun Bailey, who is now about to take up a seat in the House of Lords, was running for London mayor in December 2020.
Mr Bailey was given a peerage in Boris Johnson’s resignation honours list.
In the 45-second video on the Mirror website, people can be seen drinking and standing in groups, while a man and a woman can be seen holding hands and dancing.
Government insiders said she performed a role more like an executive assistant than a top adviser. While no one suggested she had performed badly in her No 10 job, a Whitehall source said that her junior position and short length of service meant she was “the most egregious” addition to Johnson’s peerage list. “It is impossible to defend, even as somebody who broadly thinks the current peerage system is right,” they said. “She was just incredibly junior.”
A temporary executive assistant covering for another’s maternity leave gets a peerage …
Ben Mallet, filmed at “the party” holding a glass of red wine and wearing festive braces, was the Tories’ campaign director for the 2021 London mayoral election.
Well, so far, she’s turned her hand to a small selection of undemanding positions so I’m sure that she could fulfil any special requirements of a non-technical nature that her new role may demand.
Conservative activists filmed dancing at a Christmas party during Covid restrictions in 2020 were invited to “Jingle and Mingle” according to an invite seen by the BBC.
The invitation was sent to 30 people on behalf of Shaun Bailey’s campaign for Mayor of London.
At the time London was under Tier-2 restrictions when indoor socialising was banned.
The ongoing disclosures are almost beyond comprehension …
Tories encouraging “mingling” when socialising was banned …
