Nicola Sturgeon has urged Boris Johnson to resign as prime minister over Downing Street’s Christmas party as she described him as a “corrupt incumbent of No 10”.
Although senior SNP politicians, including Ian Blackford, the party leader at Westminster, have repeatedly called for Johnson to quit over several controversies, it is highly unusual for the first minister to use such blunt language.
Asked by Gillian Mackay, the Scottish Greens MSP, whether the prime minister’s position was untenable and should he resign over the reported party that allegedly broke Covid laws, Sturgeon replied: “Yes, I do”, as Scottish Tory benches erupted.
“While Gillian Mackay was asking her question there, I had members of the Tory group shouting at me from a sedentary position that these issues had nothing to do with us here in the Scottish Parliament,” Sturgeon said.
“Well, I beg to differ. I think the principles and the values of openness and integrity and transparency matter to all of us who care about democracy in this country.
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“I don’t think it is simply a corrupt incumbent of No 10 that has to go. I think it’s time for Scotland to get rid of the whole broken, corrupt Westminster system that is holding us all back.”
She also encouraged people to keep following the rules around mask wearing in most indoor settings and the advice to take a lateral flow test every day when meeting people from another household after being asked by Jim Fairlie, the SNP MSP, if there was a risk in compliance falling in the wake of the Downing Street controversy.
Sturgeon taunted Douglas Ross, the Scottish Conservative leader who dialled in virtually while self-isolating after coming into contact with Covid-19, saying she “almost feels sympathy” for him given events engulfing the prime minister.
In the wake of the Christmas party row, Ross said “some sort of party” had taken place in Downing Street and that Johnson should quit if he is found to have misled the House of Commons.
Last December, Sturgeon apologised for breaching Covid rules after she was photographed without a face covering at a wake for Andrew Slorance, the former Scottish government official who died in Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth University Hospital after contracting Covid and another infection. He had been admitted for life-prolonging cancer treatment.
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During her exchanges with Ross, Sturgeon turned her fire on No 10, saying: “We have witnessed and are continuing to witness right now many disgusting things in politics, but none of them are on the part of this Scottish government.”
The Scottish Conservative leader was attacking comments by Patrick Harvie, the Scottish Greens co-leader and minister, who said continued drilling in the North Sea is an idea held only by the “hard right”.
Ross also sought to excoriate the first minister after she “joked and laughed” — which he described as “disgusting” — about Harvie’s statement when she quipped: “References to being right wing are references that Douglas Ross seems to take very personally.”
Sturgeon said her government is committed to a just transition away from fossil fuel extraction in the North Sea.
