Steerpike

Forget the big election debates, the defining moment of Ed Miliband's Labour leadership was his attempt at eating a bacon sandwich. In 2014 ahead of the local and European elections, Miliband appeared pained and confused as he attempted to eat a bacon sandwich in Covent Garden. The pictures that followed went everywhere as he became the subject of much ridicule. So, Mr S was pleased to learn that Miliband has found a working man's food that he appears to be able to eat in a normal manner. The MP for Doncaster North made a late night visit to the Yorkshire Pie House in his constituency last week. The restaurant reports that Miliband likes nothing more on a Friday than to 'rock' the pie house with his 'buddies': As for his pie of choice? He's a 'chicken and ham kinda guy'.

Although Nicola Sturgeon puts her career in politics down to Margaret Thatcher, she scarcely has anything positive to say about the Iron Lady. In fact, the SNP leader says that she entered politics as a result of her anger at the impact of Thatcher’s politics on Scotland. Still, she appears to have no qualms about borrowing one of the methods Thatcher used to help ensure success at the polls. The SNP's latest election advert bears the slogan 'don't just hope for a better Scotland, vote for one'. As Scottish Labour have since pointed out, this bears a strong resemblance to Thatcher's 1979 election slogan, which read: 'Don't just hope for a better life. Vote for one.

Given that the last time Dennis Skinner criticised a Tory Cabinet member in the Chamber he was ejected from the Commons, the Beast of Bolsover was on remarkably mild form today. Following Jeremy Hunt's statement on the planned junior doctors strike, Skinner told the Health Secretary that he ought to 'wipe that smirk off his face': 'When the Secretary of State came into the chamber today I don’t know whether he realises it or not but there is a smirk and arrogance about him that almost portrays the fact that he’s delighted in taking part in this activity. He could start negotiations today. Wipe that smirk off his face. Get down to some serious negotiations.

As Sadiq Khan continues to lead the polls in the mayoral race, the Labour candidate has managed to brush off much criticism over his links to unsavoury characters by putting it down to 'dog whistle' politics. However, the MP for Tooting may have greater difficulty fending off the latest line of attack to come his way. Writing in the Sunday Times, Lord Sugar -- the former Labour peer who resigned from the party after the general election -- has launched a blistering attack on Khan. Sugar accuses Khan of having 'single-handedly wrecked the Labour Party'. The Apprentice star says he cut up his party membership card after Labour turned anti-business under Ed Miliband -- and his concerns were only confirmed when Corbyn was elected as Miliband's successor.

Although Jeremy Corbyn's aides refused to confirm whether he would give a tribute to the Queen on her 90th birthday, the Labour leader did manage to put his republican tendencies to one side today in order to mark the happy occasion. After wishing Her Majesty a happy birthday, he went on to give his football team Arsenal a plug. Corbyn said that many locals believe that Her Majesty is actually a secret Gooner -- pointing to the fact that the Queen’s coronation drive went through Islington, key Arsenal territory 'Now we know the Queen is absolutely above politics. She may be above football too. But many locals harbour this quiet secret view that she actually, privately, is a Gooner.' Perhaps there is hope for relations between Corbyn and the Queen after all.

It fell on Ed Vaizey, the culture minister, to defend George Osborne's dodgy EU dossier on the BBC's Daily Politics. As you might expect, he didn't do a very good job of it. Could he explain why the Chancellor used his new, misleading metric of "GDP per household" instead of the proper (and lower) figure of household income? No, he couldn't. Could he explain why, if the Chancellor thinks this new GDP-per-household metric is so important, he divided 2030 income by the 2016 number of households (27m) rather than the expected number then (31m)? No. Could he name another Treasury budget, or pre-Budget report, where this GDP per household had ever been used before? No.

After Vote Leave were awarded the official designation to campaign for Brexit in the EU referendum, there was much disappointment from Grassroots Out and Leave.EU. So much so that the campaigns' main funder Arron Banks toyed with the idea of launching a judicial review. However, in the end the Brexit backer decided to be the bigger man and support Vote Leave for the sake of national interests: 'It is time to turn our collective guns on the real opponents in this campaign: those who are repeatedly trying to scare the British public into thinking that Britain is too small and insignificant to be an independent nation engaged with the whole world, not just one corner of it. We will be pursuing this campaign with vigour – and we’ll have some fun with it along the way.