Steerpike

Ukip has confirmed this morning that Nigel Farage's wife is still in receipt of public money — despite an on air denial from her husband. The party could not have paid for better PR on Channel 4 last night, with Farage meeting Gogglebox poshos Steph and Dom for a special one off programme. One exchange caught Steerpike's eye, regarding employment of his wife. Nige claimed Kirsten was no longer 'paid by the public sector'. In fact, the Ukip leader could not have been clearer: 'Dom: But she is also your wife and she's working for you Farage: She is no longer paid by the public sector. Dom: Ok so now you have found someone to do that job? Farage: No she is still doing it. Dom: Oh she’s just not paid? Farage: Not paid by the European Parliament no.

Ukip are cock-a-hoop this afternoon with news that controversial proprietor Richard Desmond is to donate £300,000 to Farage's party ahead of the 2015 election. Express sources confirm that Dirty Desmond gave the Ukip leader the full treatment on 2 December, with the Nigel personally given a full tour of his Northern and Shell Thames-side complex. Farage visited both the Express and Star as well as the Channel 5 newsroom before retiring up to Desmond's budget-Bond Villan style lair overlooking Tower Bridge to hammer out the deal. 'He was shown the full-weight of the machine Desmond was promising to throw behind him' says one inky-fingered whisperer.

The Roger Bird-Natasha Bolter saga continues. Text messages between the Ukip romantics have revealed by the Telegraph which paint Bolter in a less favourable than Bird. While the Ukip investigation is ongoing, Bird has told Guido that they demonstrate a 'gradual development of the relationship and make it clear that there was no impropriety involved'. That's as maybe, but is there anything proper about text flirting of this appalling calibre? Here are some more text messages from Botler to Bird: Nov 9, 17.26: "I am really missing u bird..." Nov 6, 19.05: "I have sang you praises to Nigel for 12 minutes" Nov 6, 00.24: "U r not coming back and accordingly my life will go back to a meaningless void and it was chance that I met u. But I didn't invent u - u were real...

Ralph Atkinson ranted this weekend that Ukip have ‘standards of democracy lower than the unelected European Commission’ after he was allegedly ousted as the Ukip candidate for Hastings and Rye in favour of the wealthy Gogglebox 'celebrity' Andrew Michael. Now Mr S learns of a leaked recording which appears to show Roger Helmer, MEP for Ukip, letting slip the party's selection stance when it comes to high profile names. In it he claims that Ukip is prepared to sweep away loyal local candidates for more high profile ones, as was done in the case of Douglas Carswell.

Tony Blair has taken some time out from posing awkwardly with his wife in order to pen a piece for the New York Times. While he tries to avoid getting drawn on talking about UK domestic politics explicitly, his feeling are poorly hidden: '...there have grown up powerful interest groups that can stand in the way of substantial and necessary reform. Anyone who has ever tried to reform an education system, for example, knows how tough and bitter a struggle it is. The bureaucracy fights change. The teachers’ unions fight change. The public gets whipped up to defeat change even when it is in the public’s own interest. The nearest I came to losing my job as prime minister was not over policies of war and peace, but over education reforms.

Ignore the numbers, the spin and the bleak borrowing – there is only one question that needs answering. What colour is the Chancellor's tie? Ladbrokes were offering bets on the subject, and Mr S understands a significant amount of cash has changed hands on the subject: 1/2 Blue 3/1 Purple 4/1 Green 10/1 Red 12/1 Pink 12/1 Grey 16/1 Yellow 16/1 Orange 16/1 Black 25/1 White 66/1 Hi-vis Ever the trickster, Osborne seems to have confounded the punters. Is his tie sludge green, grey or black? It seems like the matter should be referred to some sort of independent Office of Budget Betting Responsibility. Ladbrokes are yet to call it... UPDATE: Ladbrokes tell Mr S that they will pay out on grey, green and black as Osborne's tie is 'painfully ambiguous'.

There is no love lost between UKIP defectors Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless and their old Tory colleagues. Catty Conservative MPs have for some reason nicknamed the Ukip twosome 'Popeye and Olive Oyl'. Mr S will let you decide which is which.

William Hague told the Spectator's Parliamentarian of the Year awards last week that he was standing down from the Commons ‘to do some other things I’ve always wanted to do'. So far that seems to consist of expensive after dinner speeches. Accepting his lifetime achievement award at the Savoy, the one time Tory leader finally revealed the secret to how he used to get the better of Tony Blair every week at PMQs. Hague recalled how Tony had two big folders 'that went from Aardvark at top of the first folder, to Zoology at the bottom of the second, so he could find anything to show how terrible 18 years of Tory government were.' But Blair’s plan was flawed: 'Then we realised the one weakness of this all: it was in alphabetical order.

Earlier this year Zac Goldsmith complained that he had been given 'the worst office of any MP in Parliament' as punishment for his disparaging remarks about the coalition. Now word reaches Mr S that the accolade of worst office has been passed to Mark Reckless following his defection to Ukip in the Rochester by-election. Unfortunately for Reckless, as Ukip are still a minority in the House of Commons, it's the Conservatives who assign their offices. None were too happy when he defected to Ukip, and fittingly his new office reflects the ill-feeling. 'It's the size of a shoebox and the ceiling is so low Mark can't even stand up in it, that's how bad it is,' Steerpike's Commons spy says. 'It is by far the worst office he could have been given.

If ever there was a tell-tale sign of who won the Great War between the Speaker and the Clerk of the Commons, it was today's Spectator Parliamentarian of the Year awards. Sir Robert Rogers picked up the top prize, declaring: 'Common sense and good governance will prevail before very long'. Mr Speaker failed to show up. The guest of honour, Home Secretary Theresa May, delivered her own comedy turn making jokes about George Osborne's haircut. She had a point. Her barbed comment that her 'special advisers had told her' this would be a 'good idea' had a particular resonance given her starring role on the cover of this quarter's edition of Spectator Life; a profile that features her advisers heavily. Wasting no time, May attacked both of her obvious future rivals for the Tory crown.