Dominic Cummings defends himself over trip to Durham

Boris Johnson's senior aide Dominic Cummings said his decision to drive to County Durham was based not only on fears over a lack of childcare if he became incapacitated with Covid-19 but also concerns about his family's safety.

At an extraordinary press conference in Downing Street's rose garden, Mr Cummings said stories suggested he had opposed lockdown and "did not care about many deaths".

"The truth is that I had argued for lockdown, I did not oppose it but these stories had created a very bad atmosphere around my home, I was subjected to threats of violence, people came to my house shouting threats, there were posts on social media encouraging attacks."

Mr Cummings said he was worried that "this situation would get worse" and "I was worried about the possibility of leaving my wife and child at home all day and often into the night while I worked in Number 10."

"I thought the best thing to do in all the circumstances was to drive to an isolated cottage on my father's farm."

Labour MP Chris Bryant tweeted: "This Barnard Castle bit is a manifest breaking of the very express instruction not to travel that weekend. It was repeated time and again. But Cummings thought he knew better."

His party colleague Peter Kyle tweeted: "If you have symptoms you stay home...you don't go for a drive to see if your eyes work!! This is much, much worse than I had expected. Much worse. Dominic Cummings is bringing down the government right in front of our eyes."

Green Party MP Caroline Lucas tweeted: "My heart goes out to every parent making tough choices during this crisis but I'm genuinely struggling to understand why circumstances Dominic Cummings found himself in were exceptional, yet not the circumstances that saw 13yr old Ismail Mohamed Abdulwahab die alone in hospital."

Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner tweeted: "This is actually painful to watch. He clearly broke the rules, the Prime Minister has failed to act in the National interest. He should have never allowed this situation with a member of his staff."

Asked about the nature of any contact with his parents, Mr Cummings said he had had "shouted conversations" with them from a distance.

He said: "I was in a cottage, 50 metres or so away from everybody else. Obviously we kept very, very far away from them. There are various reports that I visited them, I was staying with them. That's all completely untrue.

"My parents are in their 70s. Obviously I did not want to give them this disease. And so we stayed very far away.

"We did have some conversations but they were on a farm and they were shouted conversations at a distance. They weren't some of the things that have been reported."

Mr Cummings denied he had broken the "spirit" of the rules and said he had not offered his resignation to the Prime Minister.

He said: "No, I have not offered to resign. I have not considered it.

"I think it's reasonable to say that other people would have behaved differently, in different ways, in this whole situation.

"But as I stress I was trying to balance lots of competing things."

He said he could not have remained in an isolated cottage for weeks afterwards because he was involved in vital work in Downing Street.

"I thought that if I could return to work then I should seek to return to work", he said, and took "expert medical advice" before doing so.

More to follow...