UK's Under-Fire Cummings Has Johnson's Loyalty

Cummings says he travelled to the family farm in northeast England so that his nieces could care for his 4-year-old son if he and his wife both became sick

Dominic Cummings helped Boris Johnson win power by pitting the people against the elite. Johnson’s Conservative administration has branded itself “the People’s Government.”

The prime minister’s populist appeal has been hammered by news that, as the coronavirus outbreak raged, chief adviser Cummings drove 250 miles (400 kilometers) to his parents’ house while he was falling ill with suspected COVID-19 — allegedly flouting lockdown rules that the government had imposed on the rest of the country.

Cummings says he traveled to the family farm in northeast England so that his nieces could care for his 4-year-old son if he and his wife both became sick. But that explanation cut little ice with many Britons, who say they have endured isolation, anxiety and sometimes loss in order to follow government advice to “Stay Home ... Save Lives.”

On Tuesday, junior Scotland minister Douglas Ross quit Johnson’s Conservative government, saying “the vast majority of people” didn’t agree with Cummings’ action.