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Jacob Rees-Mogg insisted those upset about partygate need ‘a sense of perspective’ after Andrew Marr opened up about his dad’s death.

Broadcaster Mr Marr said he ‘felt intensely angry’ after most of his family couldn’t be at the funeral as they were following the Covid rules Boris Johnson set, while Downing Street ‘partied’.

But Cabinet minister Mr Rees-Mogg said he had no regrets about naming the scandal ‘fluff’ and compared it to the war in Ukraine which has devastated the eastern European country for eight weeks.

The shocking interaction started with Mr Marr sharing that he had buried his father on the week ‘one of those parties took place’, adding: ‘And it was a party’.

‘He was an elder of the Church of Scotland – that church was locked and barred’, he said.

‘We had a small gathering, most of the family weren’t there. The other parishioners he would have loved to be there weren’t allowed to be there because we followed the rules.

‘And I felt intensely angry about that – and I do not regard this as fluff.’

Not commenting on the journalist’s loss, Mr Rees-Mogg responded by saying closing churches was ‘great mistake’.

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He went on to add: ‘What is happening now two years on against what’s going on in Ukraine, what is going on with the cost of living crisis, one has to get a sense of perspective. 

‘What is going on in Ukraine is fundamental to the security of the Western world, and you are comparing this to a fine issued for something that happened two years ago where the police have come to a view – that the PM has accepted – which he thought at the time was within the rules.’

Seemingly irate, Mr Marr told the Tory minister what happened to him ‘happened to so many others up and down the country’.

‘We find, I would say, that word “fluff” quite offensive’, he told him.

But the MP stood by his claims, saying the PM had ‘said how sorry he was’ and his fine was ‘not the most pressing political matter’.

When asked directly if he regretted using the word ‘fluff’, he replied: ‘No I don’t, I think it’s getting a sense of proportion.’

He added: ‘That’s not to say the PM and everybody doesn’t have enormous sympathy for people whose family members died from Covid. All deaths are sadnesses for the families they afflict in all circumstances.’

Many Brits lost someone during the pandemic, with 171,878 people dying with Covid within 28 days of positive test since the pandemic hit.

Mr Rees-Mogg’s remarks come after Mr Johnson became the first sitting British PM to have been found to have broken the law.

The Tory leader apologised during his first appearance in the Commons since being fined for going to his own birthday party.

In a bruising session on Tuesday, one of his own senior MPs told him to resign as ‘he’s not worthy of office he holds’.

It is thought Mr Johnson may face ‘at least three more fines’ with a new report claiming the worst pictures ‘are yet to surface’.

He has insisted he did not intentionally mislead Parliament with his earlier denials of rule-breaking parties, after MPs were granted a vote later this week on his alleged lying.

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