Partygate: Insiders tell of packed No 10 lockdown parties

Insiders who attended events at Downing Street during lockdown have told the BBC how staff crowded together and sat on each other's laps and how party debris was left out overnight.

For the first time, insiders who were at some of the events have told BBC Panorama in detail what they saw.

They describe arriving for work the morning after a get-together to find bottles lying around parts of the building, bins overflowing with rubbish and empties left on the table.

They also tell of events with dozens of staff crowded together, and parties going so late that, on occasion, some ended up staying in Downing Street all night.

And they say staff mocked others who tried to stop what was going on.

The prime minister's official spokesman said that Boris Johnson took revelations about what happened in Downing Street during lockdown "very seriously".

He said that the interim report by Sue Gray "raised some of these challenges" and that "wholesale changes" in how No 10 operated were made as a result, adding there were "further changes to come".

The s come a day before the senior civil servant Ms Gray is expected to deliver her report on lockdown parties in No 10.

Last week, the Metropolitan Police concluded its own investigation into rule-breaking, after issuing 126 fines - including one for the prime minister for attending a birthday party in June 2020.

However, both the police and the prime minister are facing fresh questions after ITV News obtained pictures believed to show the prime minister at a leaving party for his communications chief Lee Cain on 13 November 2020.

Speaking anonymously, three insiders have opened up about a world behind No 10's famous front door where the lockdown rules the country was living by were routinely ignored, and socialising was regular, with, they felt, the prime minister's implicit permission.

One staffer describes director of communications Lee Cain's leaving do, the event on 13 November 2020, where the prime minister has been pictured raising a glass, but for which he has not been fined.

Others have been judged to have broken the law for being there and received penalties.

Mr Johnson attended and made a speech to thank Mr Cain, but as the party developed "there were about 30 people, if not more, in a room. Everyone was stood shoulder to shoulder, some people on each other's laps…one or two people."

At the party on the eve of Prince Philip's funeral on 16 April 2021, they portray a "lively event... a general party with people dancing around".

The gathering becoming so loud that security guards in the building told them to leave the building and go into the No 10 grounds.

"So everyone grabbed all the drinks, the food, everything, and went into the garden," one source says.

"We all sat around the tables drinking. People stayed the night there."

They now concede what went on was "unforgivable".

The insiders it that events were routine.

"They were every week," one says. "The event invites for Friday press office drinks were just nailed into the diary."

The invitation was known as "WTF" - meaning "Wine-Time Friday" and a reference to a less polite acronym.

The drinks were often scheduled in No 10 for 4pm. Sources say Friday drinks had been a tradition in Whitehall for some time.

But drinking wasn't limited to Fridays. One former official describes turning up at work in No 10 often to find "A mess! There were bottles, empties, rubbish - in the bin, but overflowing - or indeed sometimes left on the table."

Nearly six months since the allegations about the parties first emerged, it is still almost impossible to believe that socialising was taking place on a regular basis in the buildings where the rules that stopped the rest of the country doing so had been set.

It's clear too that some staff were worried about what was going on, describing the "foolish" now notorious BYOB - bring-your-own-bottle - email sent by the prime minister's top civil servant, Martin Reynolds.

Instant messages were flying around between staff questioning what on earth was going on.

But a former staffer says how difficult it felt to raise concerns.

Watch Laura Kuenssberg's Panorama, Partygate: Inside the Story, on BBC Two at 19:00 BST or later on the BBC iPlayer

Another insider describes how a custodian, a Downing Street security guard, was mocked when they tried to stop a party in full flow.

"I when a custodian tried to stop it all and he was just shaking his head in this party, being like, 'This shouldn't be happening'."

"People made fun of him because he was so worked up that this party was happening and it shouldn't be happening."

How did it happen then, when the rest of the country was living under strict lockdown?

All three paint a picture of a Downing Street as a parallel universe. "We saw it as our own bubble" where the rules didn't really apply, says one.

"Everything just continued as normal. Social distancing didn't happen. We didn't wear face masks. It wasn't like the outside world."

Another even describes the events as a "lifeline" for staff who were working long hours, especially if they lived alone.

But all three point to the culture set by the prime minister himself, suggesting he "wanted to be liked" and for staff to be able to "let their hair down".

One suggests they felt like they had the prime minister's permission to socialise even it meant breaking the rules because "he was there."

"He may have just been popping through on the way to his flat because that's what would happen," they add. "You know, he wasn't there saying this shouldn't be happening.

"He wasn't saying, 'Can everyone break up and go home? Can everyone socially distance? Can everyone put masks on":[]}