Boris Johnson and Carrie Symonds were married in a secret ceremony, according to reports
As per a number of outlets, Boris Johnson and Carrie Symonds have finally held their wedding as they were married in a secret, last-minute ceremony on May 29th.
The intimate ceremony had apparently been planned for six months and kept under wraps from, with a choice few of church officials involved in the preparation. The 30 guests allowed under Covid restrictions are believed only have been informed only at the last minute, so as to keep media attention down to a minimum.
The PM and Symonds were reported as having sent save-the-date cards to family and friends for an event on 30 July 2022 but this was clearly a decoy to detract focus from the secret ceremony being organised.
The couple’s son, Wilfred, is thought to have been part of the wedding which was carried out by Father Daniel Humphreys who had baptised one-year-old in 2020. The ceremony itself was attended by two official witnesses.
One witness told sources that the cathedral was suddenly evacuated and then “was closed for about half an hour and they all came out after. It’s not very often we have weddings here, and when they came out they were all bundled into a car.”
Symonds was former press adviser for the Conservative party and is responsible for broadcast coverage during the 2015 general election. She left to join marine conservation NGO, Oceana, before securing a new job as head of communications at animal rights charity The Aspinall Foundation. The couple’s relationship was first learned of in 2019.
Symonds is Johnson’s third wife, having first married Allegra Mostyn-Owen when he was 23 in 1987. The wedding was annulled in 1993 following claims he was having an affair with lawyer and childhood friend Marina Wheeler, whom he then went on to marry in 1993.
The couple have four children, separated in 2018 and have been undergoing divorce proceedings since 2020. There has been speculation that Johnson missed crucial COBRA meetings leading up to Covid because he was writing a biography on Shakespeare, the money from which he is thought to need to pay for the divorce.
Northern Ireland first minister, Arlene Foster and work and pensions secretary, Therese Coffey, were among those to tweet their congratulations to the couple. Others were more ‘creative’, let’s say:
— Kath 💙🙀🇪🇺✊🏾 (@KathyBurke) May 30, 2021
Former Labour frontbencher Jon Trickett tweeted that the wedding was “a good way to bury this week’s bad news”, in reference to Dominic Cummings’ high profile testimony, where he thew the PM and the current administration under the bus for their handling of the pandemic, as well as the discussion surrounding Boris’ Downing Street flat refurb.
