Media

I see the new Newsnight editor, Ian Katz, is in trouble for having 'tweeted' about the performance of one of the programme’s guests in an ungallant manner. He described the Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Rachel Reeves, as being 'boring snoring' during her interview with Paxo. The Labour Party has demanded an apology and suggests that Katz’s comments 'undermine the neutrality of the programme'. As a party member, could I just be allowed to say 'piss off Labour?'  Katz’s tweet – and why he feels the need to utilise this medium Christ alone knows – revealed no such thing. In fact, I suspect Katz is a Labour supporter.

The Cameron operation’s effort to move onto an election footing continues with a set of new appointments to the Number 10 political operation. Gabby Bertin, who has been with Cameron since he became Tory leader, will return from maternity leave to become director of external relations. Bertin, who was previously Cameron’s political spokeswoman, will be responsible for forging – and maintaining Downing Street’s – relations with business, pressure groups and charities. The appointment of one of his most trusted aides to this role is a sign of how imperative Cameron believes it is to prevent Labour from securing business support at the next election.

It may not have been the smartest move to detain David Miranda, the Brazilian partner of Guardian ‘journalist’ Glenn Greenwald, under the Terrorism Act.  But the explosion of righteous anger over the episode is ridiculous. Starting with the outraged claim that Miranda was arrested only because of his connection with Greenwald. Wrong. Greenwald himself has previously told journalists that his partner assists him in his work. That present ‘work’ consists of engineering the leak of massive amounts of classified intelligence from a source – Edward Snowden – currently granted asylum in Moscow.

Listeners to the Today programme were treated to some comedy this morning, when noted Ed Miliband fan-boy Sunny Hundal tried to claim that Labour’s summer of discontent is part of a grand plan. Hundal was supposed to be countering the view that Ed is not doing enough to get to Downing Street, but ended up conceding the point live on air — and not before gentle Jim Naughtie spoke for the nation by telling the spluttering Hundal to 'shut up'. The laughter on the face of fellow guest Jenni Russell says it all. Mr Steerpike feels sorry for little Ed. With friends like Sunny...

Charming little spat between the Conservative Party and George Orwell’s old literary haunt, Tribune. The magazine, which is edited by a former Labour councillor, is up in arms because the Tories will only give it one free pass to their autumn conference. Given that the periodical has only three members of staff and is the chosen reading matter of what's left of the very left, Steerpike can see why the Tories reckon that one freeloading tribune of the people will be enough. But former Tribune editor Mark Seddon says: ‘It’s an outrage that they should pick on a small paper because it happens to be left-wing.’ A Tory insider hit back this afternoon: ‘This is typical of Labour’s something for nothing culture.

Everyone in SW1, it seems, has an opinion on this controversial scheme. Most people hate it. The general assumption is that this is a Tory stunt clothed as a government policy. The question is, though, has the van campaign been a successful policy pilot from a presentational point of view? Here are some thoughts: 1). The right-wing press. The Mail is utterly contemptuous. A leading column claims that only one illegal immigrant has stepped forward. The leader goes on to say that voters punish cheap stunts; what people want is action. And if that wasn’t enough, the paper’s front page (below) is uncompromising. All of this will have gone down badly in the Home Office, which has a good story to tell about reducing net migration. 2). Disaffected voters.

Harriet Harperson has written to the editors of seventeen national newspapers with a vast list of questions intended to discover how many women they employ, and how many are women over the age of 50. You can’t get a balanced picture of the world if women are not equally represented, she asserts in this letter. No, indeed. What the editors should do is write back to Harriet and ask how many women MPs Labour has (86, as opposed to 169 men) and also what form of chicanery – union or head office – ensured they got their jobs. Frankly, the sight of the Labour Party lecturing people on employment practices is a bit much to take right now. Harriet has also demanded that the Tour De France have a wimmin’s race. Why the apartheid?