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Jessica Heywood describes in her open letter to the Prime Minister how lockdown rules meant she and other family members had to watch as her grandfather broke down in tears first at his wife’s funeral and then at the funeral of his youngest son three months later.

She was moved to write to him after reading reports of numerous gatherings at Number 10, some attended by Mr Johnson, which are now under investigation by the Metropolitan Police for potentially breaking lockdown rules.

‘The people of Sheffield deserve better than Boris Johnson’: Politicians react t...

Jessica Heywood has shared the last family photo taken with her grandmother Margaret, who died during the coronavirus pandemic. In a heartbreaking letter to Boris Johnson, fuelled by her anger over reports of lockdown-breaking parties at 10 Downing Street, she describes how she stuck rigorously to the rules, even declining to give her grandmother a hug when she most needed one. After Margaret's death, while sorting through her possessions, Jessica found a note in her grandmother's diary which read 'please be kind to us Boris'

“At my step-grandmother's funeral, my grandfather broke down. He wept at the unexpected death of his loving wife of two years. Not one of us leant over to stroke his back or hold his hand. We kept two metres away from him. We followed the rules,” she wrote.

“Three months later, at the funeral of his youngest son, the same thing happened. We watched him weep. Immediately after the funeral we got back in our car and drove back home from Wokingham to Sheffield. We didn't go round for a cup of tea. We drove there and back in a day, for a funeral of six people. We followed the rules.”

The letter goes on to outline the guilt she still feels at being unable to comfort other loved ones because she was following the restrictions in place to prevent the spread of Covid-19 and save lives – rules for which she feels Mr Johnson and co, who set them, showed scant regard.

“I cannot express the guilt I have felt at not being able to see a dear, dear friend before her death. Not to go round and tell her I loved her or hold her hand. She wouldn't have wanted me to, because she was following the rules,” wrote the 27-year-old artist and illustrator, who is engaged to be married this summer.

“When my great uncle died suddenly it triggered a psychotic breakdown for my grandmother. She was moved into a care home and was intensely distressed. She believed in all sorts of horrific visions, and she begged for people to hold her. We didn't. We followed the rules.

“After her death I was sorting through her possessions. There was a note in her diary saying ‘please be kind to us Boris’.

“You are a disgrace.”

Explaining why she was moved to pen the letter, she said: “I didn't expect anything honourable from Johnson or this Government, but I was shocked at just how much rule-breaking there was.

“Listening to Johnson trying to defend himself, pass the blame and refuse to answer questions was really hard – it's a lack of empathy that normal people struggle to understand.

“It seems he thinks his position is a birth right because of his upbringing and that he is above everyone else - he's taken his supporters and those who lent their vote to him for fools. He is mocking us and he's unable to not laugh about it.

“Like many, our family has been deeply affected by he pandemic. Not as severely as so many others. But our family is changed, depleted and sadder. We won't get back what we've lost.”

Sheffield woman reveals late grandma's heartbreaking note to Boris Johnson, begging him 'please be kind to us'