Boris Johnson hosted the Tory peer who funded a lavish refurbishment of his Downing Street flat for dinner the day after the second national coronavirus lockdown came into force in an apparent breach of the rules, leaked files suggest.
David Brownlow, who provided £58,000 to cover some of the cost of the renovations, which included £2,260 worth of “gold” wallpaper, joined the then prime minister in the small dining room at No 10 on Friday 6 November 2020.
Just 24 hours earlier, tough lockdown restrictions banning people from any social meetings indoors, had been introduced to help control the spread of the virus. “Unless we act, we could see deaths in this country running at several thousand a day,” Johnson had warned.
Johnson’s apparent meeting with Brownlow after lockdown restrictions were imposed is one of several potential further lockdown breaches by the former prime minister revealed in leaked files seen by the Guardian. They raise further questions about Johnson’s integrity during his turbulent three years in office.
Johnson quit as prime minister in July 2022 as Tory MPs turned on him after a series of self-inflicted scandals including the Partygate affair, which resulted in him being fined by the Metropolitan police for breaking lockdown rules.
He then stood down as a Conservative MP in June 2023 after an investigation into the Partygate scandal found he had misled parliament and recommended a lengthy suspension from the House of Commons.
In a further potential breach, the files also suggest that on Saturday 20 June 2020, the day after the surprise birthday party in the cabinet room that led to his police fine, Johnson and his then fiancee, Carrie Symonds, now his wife, hosted three guests for a “private appointment” at Downing Street.
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https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/sep/08/boris-johnson-had-dinner-in-lockdown-with-peer-funding-flat-refit-files-suggest