Steerpike

Steerpike

Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike

Crisis of sincerity in the Miliband household?

Mr S started the morning with Susannah Reid and Charlotte Hawkins of Good Morning Britain. All was pootling along quietly until Ed Miliband turned up on screen. The Leader of the Opposition was doing his routine about the ‘cost of living crisis’ when Hawkins decided to put his professed empathy for humble people to the test. How much do you spend on groceries in a week? She asked. ‘We probably spend... you know, 70, 80 pounds a week on groceries at least, probably more than that.’    It sounds like there’s a cost of living crisis in the Miliband household. As Susannah Reid later pointed out, the average weekly bill for a family of four is more than £100.

Why can’t Tory MPs keep their clothes on?

The 2010 Tory intake is defined by ruthless ambition, a penchant for pamphlets and rampant Euroscepticism. But Mr S has spotted another unifying characteristic: posing in their swimwear. First we had Penny Mordaunt, the Portsmouth MP, in a variety of cossies for her appearence of flop TV show Splash! [caption id="attachment_8782581" align="alignnone" width="320"] (Image: Daily Star)[/caption] Then there was Bristol’s Charlotte Leslie, who has recreated the Baywatch pose she first struck fifteen years ago (above). While it’s all for charity, perhaps it’s also a show of party loyalty, for Young Dave never seems to be out of his trunks. Look at those legs!

Spot-a-doodle-do! Tony Blackburn’s spot the difference

'Great meeting Rob Brydon at the Chelsea Flower Show today,' tweeted veteran broadcaster Tony Blackburn earlier. ‘What a very funny and nice man’ he added with an accompanying picture of his new chum. Except the picture was of the 'funny and nice', though significantly blonder, taller and less Welsh Ben Fogle. 'That is not Rob Brydon,' he mused later. Yes Tony, we know. Is the heat getting to the old boy?

Ken Clarke is now a Liberal Democrat in all but name

Nick Clegg used to joke that he should include Ken Clarke in any list of senior Liberal Democrats. But Mr Steerpike hears things have moved way beyond that. Ken, who revealed to the Spectator that he was hoping for a coalition even before it was on the cards, is now acting with the Lib Dems on the notorious Home Affairs committee of the Cabinet. This little-known body is supposed to approve all moves the government makes — but it is now being used to allow Cleggy to veto anything he likes. He then holds the policy hostage, the demands a price for its release. So, for example, he'd try to veto the approval of pension reform unless Danny Alexander can announce minority status for Cornwall. And other such drivel. A Lib Dem plot? Actually, it's worse.

No wonder the Labour Party is broke

“We need to raise £66,000 to make…122,000 calls to Labour voters,” says a super-localised campaign email from the Labour Party. Apparently a donation of £5 will pay for ten phone calls to be made, and a £50 wedge will secure 100 of these vital calls. No wonder Labour is more than £12 million in debt: it is paying 50p per phone call! That hardly inspires confidence about the party’s economic competence.

Fallon slapped down over EU campaign comments

After Michael Fallon suggested that the Conservative party could campaign for the UK to leave the EU if a renegotiation proved unsuccessful, the Prime Minister's official spokesman was today asked about David Cameron's view on this. He said: 'The position hasn't changed. The Prime Minister is confident of success.' The Prime Minister's position is that he will definitely get the changes he wants and therefore he knows already that he will campaign to stay in the European Union in 2017. So the possibility that the party might have to campaign to stay out is being read in some quarters as a suggestion that Fallon and other ministers don't share his confidence and don't think he'll get the renegotiation result he wants.

It woz The Sun wot won it

Westbourne’s Change Opinion Awards last night might have got rather feisty. The Sun beat feminist campaigners Stella Creasy and Caroline Criado Perez to the top prize for its ‘Check ‘Em Tuesday’ breast cancer campaign, and the Anti-Page 3 brigade was in attendance. The scene was set for a showdown when the paper’s editor went to collect the award. But all turned out well. The audience was moved by the words of a representative of CoppaFeel! (the charity which ran the campaign in conjunction with The Sun) who told the crowd that she had spoken recently to recovering breast cancer patients who had got checked in time because of the campaign. Later, Mr S overheard Stephanie of No More Page 3 tell Sun editor David Dinsmore: ‘I don’t hate your paper.

Bullingdon Club: the movie

At first glance Mr S thought that he might be watching Labour’s latest class-war party election broadcast: rich kids at Oxford University trashing restaurants, tussling with the law and generally playing silly buggers in evening wear. Sound familiar? This is, however, the trailer for The Riot Club: the silver screen’s answer to ‘the Buller’, which will bear little or no resemblance to the drinking society beloved by Boris, Dave and George during their time at the university. Labour bods will be rubbing their hands with glee at the timing of the film’s release.

PR killed the Twitter star

‘I am ceasing to tweet’ wrote Matthew Parris in The Times this morning. ‘Life’s too short,’ he said. ‘Reluctantly last year I was persuaded to venture into the twittersphere; and built a herd of followers; but (as Milton might have tweeted) the hungry sheep look up and are not fed.’ So what happened? It seems that Parris objects to the colonisation of Twitter by the global PR machine: ‘If you’re commissioned to write something these days, or perform in a debate, or whatever, the client emails asking you to tweet that you’ll be doing it, or have done it, or re-tweet someone else’s reference to it, or tweet positively about something else somebody has done, and . . .

Austin Mitchell, ‘rapists’ and the death of language

In further proof that the devil makes work for idle thumbs, Labour MP Austin Mitchell described Pfizer as ‘rapists’ in a tweet. All hell has since broken loose. All of which leaves Mr S nonplussed. Definitions of the noun ‘rape’ are as follows: 1. the unlawful compelling of a person through physical force or duress to have sexual intercourse. 2. any act of sexual intercourse that is forced upon a person. 3. statutory rape. 4. an act of plunder, violent seizure, or abuse; despoliation; violation. Mr S is confident that Mitchell was using the word ‘rapists’ in the sense of the fourth definition – an act of plunder, despoliation and violation.

Michael Dobbs shuffles Cards in the House of Lords

Filming of season three of Netflix’s House of Cards will begin in four weeks’ time in Maryland, creator Michael Dobbs revealed at Norman Tebbit’s book launch last night. Lord Dobbs, who was an advisor to Thatcher, said that he had to ‘tone things down a little bit’ to make the plot ‘credible’, although he’s clearly proud of his work, telling Mr S: ‘Kevin [Spacey] is wicked. It’s like the West Wing for Werewolves’. When he’s not the toast of America’s TV, Dobbs sits on the Lords’ standards committee.

Women will inherit the earth

Mr S unleashed his inner-feminist at the Veuve Clicquot Business Woman of the Year Awards last night. Veuve Clicquot president Jean-Marc Lacave was clearly feeling equally empowered by the opposite sex, telling Mr S ‘in sixty years my dream is to have a businessman awards because the world will be run by women.’ Mr S, a convinced feminist, concurs entirely. The awards, at Claridge’s, were graced by today’s - and tomorrow’s – female entrepreneurs. Easyjet CEO Carolyn McCall, designer Lulu Guinness OBE, Martha-Lane Fox CBE (co-founder of lastminute.com and founder of JoJo Maman Bébé), and previous winner Laura Tenison MBE were all in attendance. Jenny Dawson, founder of Rubies in the Rubble, was granted the New Generation Award.

How to bug the French government

Mr has news from La Belle France, where authorities have incensed several foreign tech companies by proposing to ban geo-locating software apps to protect the antediluvian local taxi service. One of the firms in question, San Francisco-based Uber, has struck back. With a jet app: ‘All lights on the 67th edition of the Cannes Film Festival. From the airport to the red carpet and onto the private parties, you can rely on Uber to take you wherever you need to be. This year Uber goes the extra mile to order your UberJET. Your app will no longer be to request a simple car ride, you’ll now be able to use the Uber app to request an UberJET and have the privilege to fly away to and from Cannes.’ This chance to irritate the French seems too good to pass up.

Drinkaware in Chelsea

Kensington and Chelsea Council can do nothing to counter its reputation as the most affluent borough in London. In fact, it revels in the notoriety. Take a look at the council's new alcohol awareness campaign. The prostrate gentleman appears to be in white tie and drinking a half-bottle of champagne, while the lady, bedecked with pearls, swirls around with a martini glass in hand. Marvellous.

State of the Union – not good

Mr S attended the international rugby union 7s tournament at Twickenham on Saturday, which was graced by some 76,000 people – mostly yuppies on the razzle by the look of things. I regret to report that this crowd of genteel, if beery, English people loudly and roundly booed the Scottish team. The Scots ran in several tries against the hapless Portuguese, and each score was met with open resentment, while every Scottish handling error, missed tackle or infringement was cheered with glee. The noise was shattering, the atmosphere hostile. No other team received a barracking (as is right: booing is abhorrent). Even the Australians, who are the default villains at Twickenham, were given a measure of respect.

Sorry, Britain didn’t vote for the Austrian ‘Bearded Lady’

There has been plenty of progressive backslapping this morning because Britain was one of the many countries to award the full 12 points to the bearded Austrian drag act Conchita Wurst in Saturday night’s Eurovision Song Contest. We showed those bigots over in Eastern Europe and Russia a thing or two, the chatterati say. Mr S hates to be a party-pooper, but he has news for you. The British public actually voted for some Polish girls in milkmaid outfits, seductively churning butter and cleaning clothes. The Polish ladies were very self-confident, if a little old fashioned: ‘We’re Slavic girls We know how to use our charming beauty Now, shake what your mama gave ya!’ The blushes of our progressive elite were spared by the suspiciously complex voting system.

Ben Miller solves the pensions crisis – by pilfering from Doctor Who set

The new baddie from Doctor Who has come up with a novel solution to private pensions - stealing from the set. Ben Miller, star of the BBC’s Death in Paradise Drama, will guest star as “a dastardly villain with considerable sideburns” in an episode penned by Mark Gatiss. Describing himself as a “committed Whovian” he is such a fan that he is nabbing costumes and scripts in the hope that they will increase in value. Speaking to Mr S in the West End he said, “I’ve taken stuff from set including loads of photos which is very naughty because you’re not allowed to. I’ve kept everything; schedules and all the things you’ve got to wear and the scripts. I’m hording it, I’m seeing it as my pension.

Shapps: ‘I’ll be jealous if the PM gets a Nando’s black card’

David Cameron’s trip to fast food chain Nando's last night has caused a stir, with countless ‘selfies’ of the peri-peri PM appearing online before anyone could even whisper ‘cynical PR stunt’. He's not the only politician who's a fan of the Portuguese chicken chain. It's practically a second office for the Tory party chairman, who conducts meetings and lunches in its Victoria branch. Grant Shapps tells Mr S that he ‘will be jealous if the PM gets a Black Card’. The loyalty card is given to famous customers allowing them to eat for free. Though it seems Shapps’ loyalty is split: Culture Minister Ed Vaizey loves McDonalds so much he even makes his own: Of course, it’s not just Tories who are ‘Lovin' it’.

Ed Miliband needs to be smarter than this

Mr S would like to share this video with readers. It is the latest campaign ad from the Labour Party. As spoofs go, it’s leaden: puerile personal attacks mixed with divisive class war. It says nothing positive about Labour; it’s aimed squarely at people who would vote Labour in any circumstances. All in all, it’s not very clever, which is strange because Ed Miliband has spent much of the week professing that he has ‘more intellectual self-confidence’ than David Cameron. Labour staffers are certainly a little nonplussed. One party dogsbody lamented to Mr S: ‘How have we got from “I’m cleverer to that video in just 24 hours? It doesn’t add up.’ Indeed. Ed apparently has Thomas Piketty on speed dial.

London as you’ve never seen it before

The new Shangri-La hotel opened its doors to Mr S last night. Located on floor 35 of The Shard, the luxurious establishment was only, in fact, semi-open, since three ‘signature suites’ and an infinity pool are yet to be unveiled. The exhibited areas were abundant in opulence and splendour. The great and the good of luxury journalism were out in force. William Sitwell, editor of Waitrose Kitchen, Mark Palmer, travel editor of The Daily Mail and The Guardian’s Amelia Gentleman were all present to admire interior designer William Leung’s latest venture. All other glamorous guests appeared to have got lost in the lift on the way up.