Colleagues Urge Starmer to Promise to Resign If Fined for Lockdown Breach, Reports Say

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The leader of the United Kingdom's Labour Party, Keir Starmer, is being pressured by close colleagues to declare that he will resign his position if fined for breaking lockdown rules, The Times reported on Monday.

According to The Times, Starmer is consulting with shadow cabinet members, senior staff and political allies on how to proceed. His colleagues are reported to be urging him to gain back the initiative by saying that being fined for a COVID-19 rules violation is a resigning offense for party leaders. This will give the Labour leader a higher ground over Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who faced a similar scandal in the past.

The newspaper also reported that Starmer had canceled an event in Westminster today amid the scandal but was likely to make a statement later on.

Last Friday, the Durham police announced they would investigate the allegations of Starmer drinking beer and having a takeaway curry with his colleagues at a constituency office in Durham in April 2021, which, if true, was in violation of coronavirus rules at the time. The Labour leader claims that he was working with colleagues and they just decided to take a lunch break, and thus did not violate any rules. However, the Daily Mail has published a leaked memo, that purports to show that the dinner was planned in advance.

Starmer has been a vocal critic of the UK prime minister, who announced in April that he had been fined for breaking COVID-19 lockdown rules and apologized for not following the law but refused to resign over it.