Durham Police risk looking like hypocrites over Starmer case having not fined Cummings

If breaches are found, police will contradict their position on Dominic Cummings if they do fine Labour, but contradict ‘Partygate’ if they don’t, Lizzie Dearden writes

Labour leader Keir Starmer has become the centre of ‘Beergate’ (PA)

After becoming the focus of not one but two political scandals over alleged Covid breaches, Durham Constabulary find themselves in an awkward position.

In the first, they came under pressure to investigate Dominic Cummings – then the prime minister’s chief adviser – for taking his family from London to the northeast while infected with coronavirus during the first national lockdown.

Officers concluded that he might have committed a “minor breach” of the law by driving to Barnard Castle, but that issuing a fine months later “would amount to treating Mr Cummings differently from other members of the public”.