The Metropolitan Police has confirmed this morning that it will be closing its Partygate investigation after issuing 126 fines to top officials in Downing Street and Whitehall.
The conclusion of the investigation by the Metropolitan Police means that the long-awaited Sue Gray report can finally be released, following a 5-month delay.
The report is expected to be damning, in particular of the Prime Minister and his team, as well as the wider culture that has been allowed to prevail in Downing Street whilst the rest of the country was living in isolation.
There is now a question as to whether Tory MPs who were previously holding back on calling for his resignation will now be moved to act following the release of Sue Gray’s long-awaited report.
Boris Johnson has already made history as the first-ever PM to have beenfined or prosecuted for breaking the law during their time in office. It has not been clear, however, how many fines in total the PM has received – despite previous promises of transparency from No.10.
ADVERTISEMENT
At the moment, the only fine that is confirmed for the PM is for his birthday in June – however, he is also known to have attended six out of the 12 events for which other fines have been recomended or issued.
The Met has made recommendations for a total of 126 fines, but it is being reported that these will take a short time to filter through.
ADVERTISEMENT
The reason for the lack of clarity is that the events happened over eight dates, and the Met has only clarified which dates it has issued fines for as opposed to events, reports The Mirror.
The Met has said a team of 12 detectives “worked through 345 documents, including emails, door logs, diary entries and witness statements, 510 photographs and CCTV images and 204 questionnaires as part of a careful and thorough enquiry.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Throughout the investigation, officials were issued questionnaires to fill out. No one, however, was interviewed under caution by the police.
All fines given out were for breaching restrictions on gatherings, with the exception of the 20 May 2020 garden party. This was said to have breached restrictions on “leaving, or being outside of, the place where you were living without reasonable excuse”.
Acting Deputy Commissioner Helen Ball, of the Met said: “There is no doubt that the pandemic impacted all of us in so many ways and strong feelings and opinions have been expressed on this particular issue.
“When Covid regulations were introduced, the Met was clear that whilst we would not routinely investigate breaches of regulations retrospectively, there may be occasions when it would be appropriate to do so.
The information that we received with regard to the alleged breaches in Downing Street and Whitehall was sufficient to reach our criteria to begin such an investigation.
ADVERTISEMENT
“Our investigation was thorough and impartial and was completed as quickly as we could, given the amount of information that needed to be reviewed and the importance of ensuring that we had strong evidence for each FPN referral.”
Feature image – Commons Wikimedia
News
A local Manchester run club is holding two special running routes to see the total eclipse
Danny Jones
With the highly anticipated total eclipse fast approaching, people not just here in Greater Manchester but all over the UK, Europe and the rest of the world are gearing up to try and watch it – but this native running club are doing it a bit differently.
Eclipses occur once every 12-18 months, but this is set to be the biggest since 1999.
The moon is set to cover approximately 96-98% of the sun this coming Wednesday, 12 August, 2026, and rather than try to watch it from a window at home or drive to somewhere with supposedly ‘the best view’, local sports club Manchester Road Runners are turning it into their latest one-off event.
Sharing details online, the free-to-join local organisation, which boasts thousands of members on Facebook and various other platforms, will be timing things to make sure they catch the phenomenon.
Writing in the accompanying caption, the Road Runners say: “We’ve pulled some strings and have a very special event taking place on August 12th, a solar eclipse! Come run with us under a darkened sun next Wednesday from The Wharf at 18:30, with peak moon coverage expected at around 19:10.”
Better still, they’re also teaming up with their trail running spin-off club for an even more scenic twist on the evening excursion.
“If you prefer to experience your solar phenomena under the wide open skies”, they go on to write, “our friends over at Trail Division will be holding a hike/run off road, meet at Piccadilly Station at 18:00 to get shady in the great outdoors.”
Fortunately, they have issued an important disclaimer, going on to remind runners that “while beautiful and majestic, the sun should NEVER be directly looked at in the face unprotected”, signing off by adding, “Respect the sun, respect your peepers, stay ocularly safe out there.”
If you’ve never come across MRR before, they’re probably the biggest run club in the entire Greater Manchester region and their social-first jogs, intervals, track sessions and more revolve around meeting back up with your mates for a wholesome pint and a chat.
For many, it’s the biggest and the best in the city.
As for the eclipse run, it’s set to be a very magical variation on their usual Wednesday evening meets.
Quite rightly, they also point out in the post that you can actually buy certain glasses to view eclipses on these rare occasions, with search traffic often ramping up in and around these events.
Meanwhile, the Trail Division branch is yet to confirm the route for their run/hike, but it will most likely remain in the nearby North West vicinity; keep your eyes peeled on their social media pages (linked above) for more information and other upcoming trail events.
Speaking of trail runs, there’s a pretty beautiful albeit challenging one coming up next month…
Stunning vistas, walkers welcome, and multiple distances available.🏃♂️🥾
And the best part? It's less than 90 minutes away from Manchester. 🏞️
Oasis promoters drop biggest Knebworth hint yet after securing license around key date
Danny Jones
Not that we’re the type to get carried away, but we’ll confess that our curiosity, interest and general levels of anticipation have been piqued, as Oasis’ main promoters have recently renewed the license to host events at the infamous Knebworth.
My word, is this it? Like the reunion, is it ACTUALLY going to happen?…
We’re sure the raw, uncontrollable excitement will come should it be fully confirmed, but for now, all we know is that our colleagues in music media, SJM Concerts, have renewed the land in and around Knebworth Park and House for live entertainment once again.
Moreover, the company have also done so on a rather fitting date decades on from the original and legendary outdoor gigs.
As can be found on the planning application section of the North Hertfordshire Council website – the county in which the storied Britpop gigs took place – a fresh license to hold new events.
If/when the announcement happens, the already granted permission will allow for a capacity of up to 125,000 and a curfew of 3am.
We know the original Knebworth shows were beyond iconic, but let’s say this would be nailed on to be nothing short of absolutely box office.
Besides having also helped promote Oasis’ colossal Live ’25 reunion tour last summer, it’s also worth noting that they secured said license just over a week before the 30th anniversary of the pair of nights back in 1996: 10-11 August, to be specific.
The licence is said to have come into effect this past Saturday (1 Aug) and is believed to be indefinite.
What added even more fuel to the fire of these well-established rumours over the past year was when Baroness Sharon Taylor of Stevenage told the House of Lords the band would be playing FIVE whole nights at Knebworth in the future, before later clarifying that she was speaking in “hypothetical terms.”
All that being said, it’s fair to say we’ll be keeping a very keen eye on socials over the next few days, in particular, just in case.
The Manc has reached out to SJM for an official comment (surprise, surprise), but we are yet to receive a response regarding the matter.
Your silence speaks volumes, just saying.
This coming Monday, 10 August 2026, will mark the official 30th anniversary of Oasis at Knebworth 1996, and with the likes of ‘Wonderwall’ seeing a chart resurgence as the go-to England anthem at this year’s World Cup, we’re choosing to be optimistic. What about you?
Georgina Pellant -
19th May 2022 
