Steerpike

If Brexit can’t be sorted out by mere mortals, perhaps the UK and EU need some divine inspiration to break the deadlock. That was perhaps what an Irish priest was thinking when he presented Taoiseach Leo Varadkar with a bottle of holy water this afternoon. But it seems Varadkar had other ideas about what to do with it: Priest: ‘Taoiseach, I know you’re going to New York next week and meeting Boris Johnson, [here’s] a small little bit of added protection for you.’  Varadkar: ‘Do I pour it over him?’ https://twitter.com/skydavidblevins/status/1175049001126768647?

Students went on strike today worldwide to protest against climate change. Luckily, the London protest took place only a stone’s throw away from the Spectator office so Steerpike went down to Parliament Square to see what action the eco-protesters want taken as a country. Only, with signs ranging from ‘F--k Boris’ to ‘Defy Tory Rule’, and Palestinian and communist flags flying, the event could easily have been mistaken as a pre-party for Labour’s conference this weekend. Jeremy Corbyn and a slightly hoarse Owen Jones showed up to lend their support. It turns out that if you want to make a point on the environment, it's best to use plenty of expletives to get your point across.

Is Jeremy Corbyn pro Remain or pro Leave? Three years have passed since the EU referendum, but the Labour leader still won't answer that question. In an interview with ITV's Joe Pike, Corbyn was asked eight times whether he now backed leave or remain. And eight times he refused to say: https://twitter.com/joepike/status/1175034010671734784?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw Joe Pike: “So are you pro Remain or pro Leave” Jeremy Corbyn “I’m pro the British people to have their decision, I’m pro the British …” JP: “You are sitting on the fence Mr Corbyn aren’t you?” JC: “No I’m not sitting on the fence, you keep interrupting me my friend. What I want to say is this. People voted Leave or Remain.

Jean-Claude Juncker, the outgoing President of the EU Commission was in fine spirits today, as he passed on some positive news for those hoping a Brexit deal will be struck by Boris Johnson before 31 October. The former Luxembourg PM was interviewed by Sophy Ridge for Sky News, and assured her that a Brexit deal with the UK was possible, saying: 'I'm doing everything to have a deal because I don't like the idea of no deal.' But despite the news, Mr S was more struck by what Juncker had to say about the backstop. Asked by Ridge if he thought the chances of a deal being made are more than fifty-fifty, Juncker said he didn't know, before adding that: 'I don't have an erotic relation to the backship... to the backstop' A long lunch perhaps Mr Juncker? Watch here: https://youtu.

The Liberal Democrats have been going through something of a minor identity crisis as of late, after the party allowed the former Tory MP Phillip Lee to cross the aisle and join their ranks. Lee's support in the past for checking migrants at the border for HIV, and his abstention on a key vote for same-sex marriage in 2013 has led many in the party to wonder how 'liberal' a Liberal Democrat actually has to be to join the party. Happily, Mr S is on hand to inform the party that they're perhaps a more 'broad church' than many members realised.

There have been plenty of revelations about David Cameron this week, from the time he questioned Michael Gove's sanity to when he got 'off his head' on dope at Eton. But Mr S thinks our former prime minister might have saved the best admission until now. On ITV's This Morning, Cameron was talking about how he reacted when he saw the Vote Leave bus with its slogan suggesting £350m should be spent on the NHS instead of going to the EU. He told Holly and Phil: “Believe me, I did more than.. I shat at the…Sorry, I shouted at the TV”   https://twitter.com/petesaull/status/1174625857056444417?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw Mr. S feels sorry for whoever had to clean up the mess...

Boris Johnson has just cancelled a press conference after being booed in Luxembourg, but was the Prime Minister set up? Luxembourg's leader Xavier Bettel took a dig at Boris Johnson as he gave a short speech next to an empty lectern. Bettel said he 'wanted to thank Boris Johnson' as he pointed into thin air: https://twitter.com/BBCPolitics/status/1173600589864820736?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw But Mr S. thinks it is hard to blame Boris Johnson for refusing to go ahead when he is likely to have been drowned out by the noise from protesters outside. The BBC's Laura Kuenssberg now reports that No.10 asked for the conference to be moved indoors so that the two leaders could be heard, only for the request to be rejected. So why weren't the podiums moved inside?

Jo Swinson has said she will never forgive David Cameron for calling the EU referendum in 2016. 'I think so many of the problems that we are facing right now stem from David Cameron’s shocking misjudgement in putting the interests of the Conservative party ahead of the national interest,' the Lib Dem leader told her party's conference in Bournemouth. But Mr S. notes that Swinson hasn't always thought that way about a referendum. Back in 2008, Swinson told the Commons that she backed “a referendum on the major issue of in or out. It’s on the issue of in or out of Europe”. https://twitter.com/adam_heilbron/status/1173398729304543239?

When Jo Johnson quit government, reports began to circulate that his wife Amelia Gentleman – the Guardian journalist – had put pressure on him to leave frontline politics and thereby not serve in his brother Boris Johnson's government. The Sun reported that Gentleman had grown tired of 'seeing Boris presiding over an increasingly fractured government, threatening to break the law and promising to drag the country out of the EU or die in a ditch' and told Jo he had to choose between her and his brother. Now Gentleman has offered an insight into her relationship with her husband's brother.