EY accountancy firm staff held Christmas party ‘reported to the police’
Company says event ‘organised independently by individuals involved’
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Your support makes all the difference.One of the UK’s top accountancy companies have investigated staff members for throwing a Christmas party in London while strict Covid rules on large gatherings were still in place.
More than 25 staff from EY – including two partners at the firm – reportedly attended a Christmas dinner at the Roast restaurant on 11 December, when rules banned all mixing between households.
EY confirmed that it had “investigated this matter”, but attempted to distance the company from the event by saying it had been “organised independently by the individuals involved”.
Sources present at the party told The Times there had been mingling between people seated at five separate tables, forcing restaurant staff to intervene.
The gathering was reported to the Metropolitan Police in February for an alleged breach of lockdown rules, according to the newspaper – but no action appears to have been taken.
A spokeswoman for EY said: “We have issued our people with regular guidance on meetings and social distancing requirements and continue to closely follow government advice. We take our responsibilities very seriously and have investigated this matter internally. We are declining to comment further.”
The company – one of the so-called “big four” accounting firms in the UK – did not deny it paid for the cost of the staff party.
The event at Roast was held while London was still under tier 2 restrictions, when restaurants were only allowed to seat customers at a table if they were from the same household.
The rules did permit people to meet up with people from separate households in restaurants, so long as it was for business meetings. The government’s guidance stated: “Gatherings for work purposes are only allowed where they are reasonably necessary.”
Leading Conservative MP Tobias Ellwood was criticised for attending a 15 December dinner for more than two dozen guests at a private club in London listed as a “Christmas Party”.
The MP, chairman of the defence select committee, insisted it was a business meeting. But home secretary Priti Patel criticised his behaviour, saying: “Having dinner outside of the rules with a large number of people is a breach of the regulations.”
The Independent has contacted Roast and the Metropolitan Police for comment on the EY staff event.
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