Steerpike

Dying is easy, comedy is hard. It seems it's even harder when you're a Tory politician. Mr Steerpike has barely had time to pick himself up from the floor after this afternoon's humorous offerings from the Conservative party conference stage, with dreadful jokes infiltrating both the speeches and the awkward panel discussions between ministers. Here are some of the worst. Please do let us know if you've come across any more howlers. Jake Berry: The only homes we are not going to build in the North of England is Sherlock Holmes! *** Esther McVey: While the Conservative party is building homes for the future, the only thing the Labour Party is building is a Brexit fence to sit on! *** Liz Truss: I’ve just flown round the world meeting our key allies.

The judiciary has come in for a hard time following the Supreme Court's decision that Boris Johnson's prorogation of parliament was unlawful. But Lady Hale and her ten fellow justices found a staunch defender at Tory party conference this evening in the form of Robert Buckland. The Lord Chancellor hit out at critics who said their decision was politically motivated. And he told those gathered at the fringe event to ignore anonymous briefings from 'unaccountable' people: It's been quite a few weeks as a member of Cabinet, but I can tell you as well that our judiciary is in good heart, too, because whatever one thinks about the merits of decisions that are made, one iron rule has to apply: We have an independent judiciary. We have respect for the rule of law.

David Cameron's autobiography was supposed to be a chance for the former prime minister to settle scores and have his say on his time in office. But Cameron's book is also something that he didn't intend: a convincing case for Brexit. 'For the Record' is littered with examples of EU officials and council members undermining UK interests and reneging on promises. Here are 13 times David Cameron's book makes the case for Brexit: Jean-Claude Juncker frustrating British interests:  ‘Jean-Claude Juncker, the prime minister of Luxembourg, was particularly dismissive of British concerns. As a finance minister, he’d been there at Maastricht when the journey to monetary union began. He’d been there when we refused to join the euro.

Justin Trudeau found himself in hot water last week after pictures emerged of him 'blacking up' for a fancy-dress party. A week on, an unlikely supporter has leapt to the Canadian prime minister's defence. Step forward, Desmond Swayne. In a blog on his website titled 'Trudeau's Turban', the flamboyant Brexiteer said the only thing Trudeau did wrong was say sorry. Swayne then made a surprising confession of his own: 'I once went to a ‘Blues Brothers’ themed fancy-dress party as James Brown. I went to some trouble to be as authentic as possible.' So will Swayne now follow in Trudeau's footsteps and say sorry? Don't bank on it: 'I can assure readers of this column that I have no intention of apologising.

There is no love lost between MPs in the Commons today following last night's fractious debate. But has one Labour MP gone a little too far in calling for her opposite number to say sorry? Shadow Commons leader Valerie Vaz took to her feet this afternoon to ask Geoffrey Cox to ‘come to the House to apologise’. The reason? For ‘calling us turkeys’, Vaz told the Commons. Mr S. remembers hearing worse in the school playground...

Geoffrey Cox is not a happy bunny. The Attorney General has just blasted MPs, telling them that Parliament is a 'disgrace'. Here's what he had to say in the Commons: 'This Parliament has declined three times to pass a withdrawal agreement. Then we now have a wide number of this house setting its face against leaving at all. And when this government draws the only logical inference from that position, which is that it must leave therefore without a deal at all. It still sets its face, denying the electorate its say in how this matter should be resolved. This parliament is a dead parliament. It should no longer sit. It has no moral right to sit on these green benches... ' Mr S. finds it difficult to disagree.

What's the biggest threat facing the Labour party? The Tories? The Lib Dems? Brexit? All wrong, says pro-Corbyn film director Ken Loach. The Kes filmmaker reckons its the likes of Tom Watson and other Labour MPs failing to line up behind Jeremy that is the thing to worry about right now. Loach told Mr S's favourite paper, the Morning Star, that 'the right inside Labour are the biggest obstacle to a Labour government'. He said: 'The right wing of the Labour party is the biggest threat we face. These are the inheritors of Ramsay MacDonald, Neil Kinnock and Roy Hattersley, Blair and Brown. The right, embodied by Tom Watson, aims to destroy the socialist programme. In the party there is the leadership and a core of socialists backing it.

Labour conference was mired in controversy this afternoon, as the party voted against backing  Remain in a second referendum. While the party's conference ended up passing Jeremy Corbyn's preferred Brexit position, the key vote on whether Labour would back Remain was only dropped after Labour's general secretary and Corbyn ally, Jennie Formby overruled the debate chair. Labour motions at conference are voted on with a show of hands, and at first, the chair of the debate believed that the Remain motion had passed – which would  have been an embarrassing setback for Jeremy Corbyn. Remarkably though, the chair's decision was then contested by Formby, who believed more people had voted against the motion in the hall.

Here we go. As the debate continues within the Labour party as to which Brexit policy will win the party the most seats at a general election, the mainstream domestic policy agenda is progressing nicely. This evening, Labour delegates approved a motion for a Labour government to seemingly abolish private schools. The motion is to 'integrate' private schools into the state sector. Rather than knock them down, the idea appears to be that a school such as Eton would become part of the state system. However, Mr S's Labour mole says there is a grey area as to the exact details as the motion passed is clumsily worded. Set aside the small matter that private schools educate 15pc of sixthformers (ie, the ones who apply to university) when 7pc is a figure for the whole system.