Boris Johnson will reportedly ‘take paternity leave later in the year’ after he and fiancée Carrie Symonds welcomed their first child together this morning.

The prime minister is said to want to keep a ‘firm grip’ on important decisions about the coronavirus lockdown after returning from three weeks sick leave, the London Evening Standard reports.

Speaking to Metro.co.uk earlier this morning, Downing Street said no plan had been outlined to them yet, but a formal announcement would be made soon on this issue.

A spokeswoman for the Tory leader and his partner said both mother and baby are ‘doing very well’ after the birth of a ‘healthy baby boy’ in a London hospital on Wednesday.

The Tory leader had previously suggested that he intended to take the time off. When questioned on the topic at a Downing Street news conference in early March, he replied: ‘Almost certainly, yes.’

If Mr Johnson took paternity leave, he would follow in the footsteps of David Cameron, who took his statutory two weeks’ leave after he and wife Samantha welcomed daughter Florence in 2010.

However, not all prime ministers take their full allotted period of time. In 2000, Tony Blair refused to take paternity leave when his son Leo was born, instead saying he would temporarily be in ‘holiday mode’.

In an interview The Observer, he said: ‘I don’t ever stop being prime minister, even when I’m on holiday I do several hours a day.

‘But of course I want to spend more time with Cherie when the kid is born to help out and I will do that.

‘I don’t know if that makes me taking paternity leave or not but it is just the common sense of the situation.’

He added: ‘I obviously will try as much as possible to cut down in that period what I’m doing. But I have to run the country, that still has to go on.’

This is a breaking news story – more follows.

Coronavirus latest news and updates

• Visit our live blog for the latest updates: Coronavirus news live
• Read all new and breaking stories on our Covid-19 news page
• Coronavirus symptoms explained
• Find out the latest on which shops can stay open in a lockdown
• Who needs to go to work, who needs to stay at home and who is classed as a key worker?

Source: Read Full Article