Sheffield health worker says Downing Street parties are a ‘body blow’ to public servants

Caroline Mitchell, who works as a GP at Woodhouse Medical Centre in Sheffield, has questioned the Prime Minister’s leadership and moral authority during the pandemic and said the latest revelations are ‘acting as a body blow to every public servant of the land’.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Any Answers, Caroline recalled what life was like as a health worker on the frontline during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic at the same time the parties are alleged to have taken place.

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Caroline said: “In my practice, we wore masks from dawn till dusk, we worked without breaks, and the morale was shot.

“The public got out onto their doorsteps, and Boris Johnson got out onto his. Little did we know, when he closed the door, something different was happening in his workplace.

“I would say on behalf of the British public, all the key workers and companies, all of us, what we did was we went in and upheld those public health rules because they were the only way we could save each other.

“Vaccine scientists, doctors and nurses, midwives were not going out into gardens behind closed doors. We were not doing that. At home, we separated ourselves from our loved ones so we couldn’t bring covid to work and wouldn’t harm our patients and colleagues.

“So where were the government when we needed them, where was Boris Johnson and his moral authority and leadership. Why weren’t they leading from the front.”

Her fury comes as a result of an email leak, which revealed that 100 Downing Street employees were invited to a “bring your own booze” party at No 10 during the Covid lockdown on May 20, 2020.

At the time, only two people were allowed to meet each other outside, two metres apart.

On Wednesday, Mr Johnson apologised in Parliament for attending the event, saying he attended for around 25 minutes to “thank groups of staff” and believed “implicitly” that it was a work function.