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| Allegra Stratton |
Allegra Stratton, a spokesperson for UK prime minister Boris Johnson, has resigned her post after a video leaked to ITV showed her joking about an alleged Christmas party that took place in Downing Street in violation of the government's COVID-19 lockdown rules.
A tearful Stratton said her remarks seem to make fun of the COVID-19 restrictions.
"That was never my intention. I will regret those remarks for the rest of my days and I offer my profound apologies to all of you at home for them," she said.
Stratton apologized to people "who lost loved ones, who endured intolerable loneliness and who struggled with their businesses."
The Christmas party debacle could undermine efforts by Johnson's government to control the pandemic as the Omicron variant threatens to trigger another wave of sickness and death in the country.
"In the middle of a national crisis where we need to react quickly and need to know how to react, we need a government that can guide us; a government that we think of as 'them', and as dishonest, and as liars, is not the government we need right now," Stephen Reicher, a professor of psychology at the University of St Andrews," told the Guardian.
The Christmas party report represents a "betrayal of trust," said Heidi Larson, director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine's Vaccine Confidence Project. "It's not good for a public that is really tired, that's exhausted and ready to see the end of this pandemic."
Johnson on Dec. 8 apologized for the video.
He said he is "furious" about it and has launched a probe into whether any COVID-19 rules were broken.
The board of PRSA-NY sent a message today to members to direct them to its statement on the situation in Israel/Gaza.
To prepare for a crisis, companies need a team of experts—legal, investigative, forensic and crisis communications—to ensure proper strategy and communications through “make or break” situations. 
The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers has retained The Levinson Group for PR support in its battle with striking screenwriters and actors over compensation and the use of artificial intelligence.
Real Chemistry has recruited Edelman US crisis & risk chair Steve Behm as practice leader of its crisis communications and corporate reputation practice. It also adds Weber Shandwick social impact veteran Brian Tjugum to head its group.
When dealing with a crisis, you need to start by identifying where in proximity to the organization’s reputation it lies, so, like a cancer, you can isolate it and neutralize it before it grows.
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Dec. 9, 2021, by Joe Honick
Sadly, whenever we look for some relief from our own ongoing political carnival here in the United States, we can always stand back and look at Britain's realistic version of SNL. And we both have the nerve to wonder why China's Xi and Russia's Putin feel so comfortable playing dangerous games with us.