Will not resign

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, fighting to save his premiership amid a storm over a series of lockdown parties in Downing Street, yesterday told parliament that he would not resign. 

Seven Conservatives said they had filed letters demanding a Tory vote of no confidence in the embattled Johnson, and more than 20 others were reported to have coalesced in an organised revolt.

One of the seven Tories, Christian Wakeford, took the dramatic step of joining the opposition party, minutes before Johnson faced Labour leader Keir Starmer at their weekly joust in the House of Commons.

Johnson, who in 2019 won his party's biggest majority in more than 30 years on a pledge to "Get Brexit Done", has repeatedly apologised for the parties and said that he was unaware of many of them.

Starmer, who welcomed the defection of Wakeford, asked Johnson if a prime minister should resign if he misled parliament.

Asked directly if he would resign, Johnson said: "No".

To trigger a leadership challenge, 54 of the 360 Conservative MPs in parliament must write letters of no confidence to the chairman of the party's 1922 Committee. An analysis by The Times newspaper showed that 58 Conservative lawmakers had openly criticised the prime minister.

Toppling Johnson would leave the United Kingdom in limbo for months just as the West deals with the Ukraine crisis and the world's fifth largest economy grapples with the inflationary wave triggered by the Covid pandemic.