No10 court battle to keep how much booze was used at bashes during Covid secret

09 April 2023 , 20:12

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No10 has so far scrambled to keep under wraps what wine it used for the Covid parties (Image: Getty Images)

A bid to keep No10 booze figures a secret is going to court.

Officials in charge of the Government’s wine cellar have refused to say how many bottles were brought out for functions at No10 in the two years of the Covid pandemic.

Despite previously revealing how much wine and what vintages were used for visits by the Pope and President Barack Obama, the Foreign Office now says it wants to keep the information under wraps.

It rejected a Freedom of Information request for details of the functions. But the case will now go to the Information Tribunal after transparency campaigners stepped in.

The then prime minister Boris Johnson at a gathering in the Cabinet Room in 10 Downing Street on his birthday (PA)

In its court documents the Foreign Office stated: “It may compromise the goal of such international engagement by providing a running commentary of which foreign representatives were met and which were not met; how much was spent on one country, as opposed to the other; and diminish the ability to engage in secure and confidential channels of communication.”

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Downing Street said none of the events catered for by its £2million, 40,000-bottle stash broke Covid rules and were not part of the Partygate probe.

Matthew Davis