Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike
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Perhaps the most cathartic moment of The Spectator’s Parliamentarian of the Year awards was when the relatively quiet former PM Theresa May had a pop at the not-so-quiet Piers Morgan. Picking up her award for Speech of the Year, May did acknowledge her weak reputation as a rhetorician. But she got Piers where it hurts:
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If there’s an upside to spending tens of thousands of pounds – as Boris Johnson did – in doing up his Downing Street flat, it’s surely that such a costly renovation will stand the test of time. Unfortunately the £88,000 makeover at No.11, masterminded by A-list interior designer Lulu Lytle, appears to have already seen
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What a year in politics it has been. 2022 has seen five Education Secretaries, four Chancellors, three Prime Ministers but there is only one Spectator and so it was no surprise to see some of Westminster’s most familiar faces descend on London’s Rosewood Hotel. Ministers and their opposite numbers tonight enjoyed the chance to break
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He’s back! Denied power at home, Boris Johnson grabs headlines abroad. The Etonian elephant is currently marauding around Europe, firing off quotes with the force of a Maxim gun. Speaking to CNN Portugal on Monday, Johnson discussed a veritably smorgasbord of issues: Partygate, the mini-Budget and his abortive brief-lived comeback. But it was his reflections
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Owen Paterson – there’s a name Mr S hasn’t heard in a while. It was just over a year ago that the former Environment Secretary became embroiled in the infamous lobbying scandal which led to his resignation, the North Shropshire by-election and the beginning of the end of Boris Johnson. But now, after a year
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Oh dear. The nationalists are at it again. In the past 48 hours, two examples have shown how –despite being Scotland’s main governing party for the past 15 years – old habits die hard in the SNP, where protest and grievance are the de facto response to any minor irritation. First, consider the BBC News
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What a year it’s been for Jeremy Hunt. Just four months ago, he was running to be Tory leader on a platform of lower taxes. Back then he was urging his party to cancel Rishi Sunak’s planned rise in corporation tax and instead reduce the rate from 19 per cent to 15 per cent. Now of
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The Autumn Statement was truly awful: no rabbits, no silver linings and no growth. But amid the many groups suffering this Christmas, spare a thought for high-earners — those much-despised but ever-necessary wealth creators. The 45p top rate of tax now applies to anyone earning over £125,140, with fiscal drag pulling many more in. The
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Much was made of Ian ‘beefy’ Botham’s ennoblement in 2020. The hero of Headingley was the headline announcement of the 36 new peers created in Boris Johnson’s dissolution honours’ list; a year later he received another bauble as a UK trade ambassador to Australia. The then Trade Secretary Liz Truss claimed he would ‘bat for business
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Oh dear. It seems that the Scarlet Pimpernel of politics is at it again. Chris Bryant likes to portray himself as the sleazebuster-in-chief, fearlessly standing up for standards in public life. But in his haste to hold his fellow politicos to account, it seems that Bryant has blundered in his eagerness for retweets. Steerpike’s colleague
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The World Cup is just three days away and as Westminster prepares to watch the big event, some in SW1 will have a better knowledge than others about the Gulf state. The host nation is expected to spend up to £138 billion on hosting the tournament, with fortunes lavished on new stadia hotels, roads, public
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Boris Johnson hasn’t always enjoyed the best relationship with Rupert Murdoch’s titles, having once been sacked as a Times trainee for fabricating quotes. But relations between the former Tory leader and the Sun king himself have been cordial for much of the past decade. And evidence for that is found in the newly updated register
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The China hawks were out in force last night. Over at the Walkers of Whitehall tavern, it was the turn of Alicia Kearns to charm the Onward think tank. To a packed audience, the Rutland and Melton MP was hailed as ‘the youngest select committee chair, the first female Foreign Affairs committee chair and the
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Justin Trudeau might be the self-anointed king of elite liberal opinion but it appears his methods find little favour with Beijing. Cringeworthy footage has now been released of President Xi Jinping dressing down the Canadian premier on the side-lines of the G20 conference. The two leaders were caught on camera having an, er, lively discussion
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‘It’s coming home!’ England fans may cheer next week in Qatar but there’s one thing Commons’ bosses don’t want coming back with them: malicious viruses that could put parliament’s internet system at risk. Security chiefs on the Westminster estate have issued strict guidance to those football fanatics heading off to the oil rich Arab country
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First it was Suella Braverman, then it was Gavin Williamson, now it is Dominic Raab. Three ministers have been in the crosshairs of Westminster’s press pack these past three weeks. The first survived, the second resigned and now it is the turn of the Deputy Prime Minister to experience life at the centre of a
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Another week and another minister under pressure. But rather than hand in his resignation notice like Gavin Williamson, Dominic Raab has chosen to come out swinging against his critics. Facing questions about his conduct, the Deputy Prime Minister, Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (as he likes to be called) has drafted a
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It used to be said that political parties were Eurosceptic in opposition, but Europhile in government. The same perhaps could now be said of China. Back in July, Rishi Sunak was keen to talk tough on the Beijing behemoth, which he called Britain’s ‘biggest long-term threat’. He tweeted that ‘China and the Chinese Communist party represent
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With just three days to go until the awful Autumn Statement, Westminster is agog to find out just how truly terrible it’s going to be. Taxes? Up! Cuts? Aplenty! Growth? Flatlining! So, as we await with morbid fascination to see what the new season of Jeremy Hunt’s Fiscal Drag Race has in store for us,
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Cast your minds back sixteen months ago. Back then, Boris Johnson was in his pomp, having narrowly missed out on winning the Batley by-election. The vaccine roll-out was underway, with the UK leading the world out of Covid. And in the Labour party, there was much excited talk of a challenge by Angela Rayner to