Henry Newman during his time as a councillor in Frognal

A FORMER councillor has been found to not have broken any Covid rules while working as an adviser at Downing Street.

Henry Newman had faced intense Partygate speculation over whether he had been given a penalty similar to those received by former prime minister Boris Johnson.

Asked by the New Journal to clear up whether he had been among scores of people fined for attending gatherings during lockdown, he said that he was not on that list, had not paid a fine and he had been able to produce evidence that he had done nothing wrong.

Mr Newman, tipped as a possible future MP, has been at the party’s annual conference in Birmingham this week. He had not answered the question from the New Journal while police were investigating events that took place at Downing Street – but said now that these inquiries were finished, he could confirm that he had not been among those penalised.

Mr Newman, a close friend of Carrie Johnson, the prime minister’s wife, stood down from the council in May after a four-year spell representing Frognal.

His day job at Downing Street often led to jokes in the council chamber, while, more seriously, the Liberal Democrat group called on the local Tories to say one way or another if Mr Newman had been at any party that broke the Covid rules set by the government to curb the spread of the virus.

They warned that he should resign as a councillor if fined for a breach. Mr Johnson apologised for appearing at a gathering in May 2020 – but the revelations contributed to his declining authority as prime minister.