A SOMERSET MP has called yesterday's press conference by the Prime Minister's special adviser Dominic Cummings a 'bizarre public trial-by-TV'.

David Warburton, the Conservative MP for Somerton and Frome, also said Mr Cummings - who has admitted making a 260-mile journey to a family cottage in County Durham during lockdown - had enjoyed 'indulgences denied to all others'.

He said: "Yesterday's bizarre public trial-by-TV saw (Dominic Cummings) lay out decisions he took for his family.

"Decisions that incurred multiple breaches of his own (Government) guidelines, on the basis of his exceptional needs.

"Indulgences denied to all others, whatever their circumstances."

On Monday, Mr Warburton told the BBC Breakfast programme how his own family had been struck by tragedy during the lockdown, with his own father passing away, 'alone'.

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"We've all suffered under the regulations, there are parents not able to see children, elderly people isolated and alone - people like my own father, who died alone - relatives put off from people they love," he said.

"But what my constituents are seeing - and what I'm hearing from hundreds and hundreds of emails and letters and phone calls - is double standards, and that's really not a good look, particularly when it surrounds someone who's themselves been part of defining the rules which all the rest of us have to endure."

The furore surrounding Mr Cummings has continued today, after he said he would not apologise for making the journey, which he said he made due to concerns over childcare should he and his wife become ill.