‘Mish-conduct’: Johnson hammers Starmer over previous paid legal work
Boris Johnson has tried to put Sir Keir Starmer front and centre of Westminster’s sleaze scandal as he called the Labour leader out for previous legal work he has done while sitting in parliament.
Johnson repeatedly hectored Starmer in Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) today over £25,000 of legal work he did at the end of 2019, before he was Labour leader, leading to a series of rebukes from House of Commons speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle.
Johnson released proposals last night to ban MPs from having political consultancy jobs in response to the ongoing sleaze scandals that have hit Tory MPs.
Labour is calling for MPs to be banned from all second jobs, with only “limited exemptions” to the rules such as for work in the NHS.
Johnson pointed out that Starmer previously would have been in breach of his own rules as he has been paid tens of thousands of pounds for legal consultancy work since becoming an MP in 2015 and also had talks with law firm Mischon De Reya in 2017 about a permanent role.
The Prime Minister said Starmer’s “own Mish-conduct is absolutely clear to everybody”.
“Perhaps he can clear up from his proposals whether he would continue to be able to take money as he did from Mischon De Reya and other legal firms,” Johnson said.
“In a classic lawyerly way, [Starmer] is trying to prosecute others for exactly the course of action that he took himself.
“He seeks to criticise this government while refusing to explain his own position.”
Johnson’s line of attack led to several interventions from Hoyle, who kept reminding him that it was “Prime Minister’s questions” and that it’s “not on the opposition to answer your questions”.
“I’m not going to be challenged – you may be the Prime Minister of this country but in this house I’m in charge,” Hoyle said.
“I don’t think this has done this house any good today. I’ll be quite honest, I think it’s been ill-tempered and I think it shows the public this house has not learnt from the other week.”
The proposed rule changes come after Owen Paterson was forced to resign as an MP over the government’s botched attempt to get him off the hook for breaking parliamentary rules on lobbying.
The saga sparked a wave of sleaze stories about a large group of Tory MPs and their lucrative second jobs.
Senior Tory Geoffrey Cox has particularly been criticised, after it was revealed he made hundreds of thousands of pounds working for the British Virgin Islands (BVI) on corruption charges brought forward by the UK government.
Starmer today said Johnson was a “coward, not a leader”.
“Weeks, weeks, weeks defending corruption,” he said.
“If somebody in my party misbehaves, I kick them out. When somebody in his party misbehaves, he tries to get them off the hook. I lead, he covers up.”