Boris Johnson resigns as MP with immediate effect over Partygate report

Boris Johnson is standing down immediately as a Conservative MP after an investigation into the Partygate scandal found he misled parliament and recommended a lengthy suspension from the House of Commons.

The former prime minister angrily accused the investigation of trying to drive him out, and claimed there was a “witch-hunt underway, to take revenge for Brexit and ultimately to reverse the 2016 referendum result”, The Guardian reports.

Johnson hinted that he may try to make a return to politics, saying he was “very sad to be leaving parliament – at least for now”.

His departure from political life comes less than four years after he won an 80-seat political majority and nine months after he stood down as prime minister after a police fine for breaking his own Covid rules.

In his statement, Johnson hit out at political enemies for targeting him after he was shown the privileges committee findings against him earlier this week.

“It is very sad to be leaving parliament – at least for now – but above all I am bewildered and appalled that I can be forced out, anti-democratically, by a committee chaired and managed, by [the Labour MP] Harriet Harman, with such egregious bias,” he said.

“Their purpose from the beginning has been to find me guilty, regardless of the facts. This is the very definition of a kangaroo court.”