Steerpike

It’s fair to say that there is no love lost between Philip Hammond and Gavin Williamson. The chancellor and defence secretary have been sniping at each other for months – and there were claims that the rivalry between the pair even escalated into a full-blown row in the Commons in December, with Theresa May forced to intervene. The tensions between the two have shown no signs of settling down since. But now Philip Hammond is no longer alone in his battle against his cabinet rival. His old school mate, Richard Madeley, is giving his fellow Essex boy a helping hand. Madeley – who attended the same school as Hammond back in the 70s – famously 'terminated' Williamson in a TV interview last week after the defence secretary repeatedly refused to answer a question.

Gavin Williamson is the unfortunate victim of the Parliamentary recess. With little in the way of political news, the Defence Secretary's awkward exchange with Richard Madeley over his 'shut up and go away' Russia comment has received a lot of attention. Now the Good Morning Britain presenter has decided to prolong Williamson's turmoil a bit longer by penning a Guardian deep dive on the interview: Madeley says that he was keen to ask Williamson about his un-statesmanlike Russia comments as he was rather unimpressed by them at the time: 'I freely admit that I was one of those who thought Gavin Williamson’s “Shut up and go away” instruction to the Kremlin after the Salisbury nerve-agent attack was risible. Defence secretary as petulant pre-adolescent. Not a good image.

Oh dear. It's six months since Philip Hammond stood up in the Autumn Budget and announced a new railcard for those aged 26-30 'giving 4.5m more young people a third off their rail fares'. Yet the millennial railcard remains a near mythical artefact – with a mere 10,000 released on the day of the official 'national' launch. It's understood the delay is down to a row over who should pay for them. The Treasury had hoped they would be a cost neutral policy but Network Rail aren’t convinced so it is being slowly trialled – and in the short term the Treasury don’t want to be landed with a bill while everything is worked out. Now it seems even Tory MPs are growing tired of the delay.

Boris Johnson has been caught in a prank call by a pair of Russian comedians posing as the Armenian prime minister. The Foreign Secretary is recorded discussing Russia's involvement in the poisoning of Sergei Skripal and offering tips to the pranksters on how to deal with Vladimir Putin. In a recording of the phone conversation posted on YouTube, Boris tells one of the duo: 'We don't want a cold war but we do want to see an improvement in the way Russia behaves' After an 18-minute discussion, the call ends abruptly. The Foreign Office has confirmed that the recording is of Boris Johnson. So, how did this security breach come to be? Steerpike understands that the hoaxer first made contact not with Johnson but with Foreign Office minister Alan Duncan.

Over the past few weeks, company emails have been flooding into inboxes asking the recipient to give consent to remain on mailing lists. Given the repetitious nature of the message, the emails have begun to all fade into one. So, today's GDPR email from the Labour party stuck out thanks to its originality. In a plea to Labour supporters, party staffers asked recipients to click the 'keep me updated' button on the basis that it's Jeremy Corbyn's birthday this weekend and 'the last thing he wants as a gift is to see our movement lose strength!': Who ever said Corbyn's Labour was a personality cult...

To the launch of Onward, the new liberal Conservative think tank. A who's who of the Tory party, including Liz Truss, Tom Tugendhat and James Cleverly, gathered in Parliament's Churchill room to raise a glass to the new venture – headed by Theresa May's former policy wonk Will Tanner. Launching the event were the new dream team: Ruth Davidson and Michael Gove. Neither were shy in coming forward. The Scottish Conservatives leader began her speech by joking that the reason she had been invited was to prove the Tory party is diverse: 'In future when think tanks ask please, can we get a pregnant lesbian, the answer for all those of us who are modernisers in the Conservative Party should be ‘which of the many pregnant lesbians?