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

Beeb faces questions after Huw Edwards’ guilty plea

From our UK edition

After Wednesday’s news that BBC veteran Huw Edwards pleaded guilty to making indecent images of children, the Beeb is facing a period of reckoning. And the institution is very much under the spotlight after it transpired last night that despite knowing Edwards had been arrested last November, it employed him on his top salary for

How many stars got the Huw Edwards case wrong?

From our UK edition

Dear oh dear. The news that ex-BBC presenter Huw Edwards has pleaded guilty to making indecent images of children has come as a shock to a nation which spent years watching the veteran TV star fronting the public service broadcaster’s biggest stories. And it will serve as a warning to those journalists who were rather

Listen: BBC say Haniyeh considered a ‘moderate’ Hamas leader

From our UK edition

Uh oh. The BBC has come under fire once again after listeners took umbrage with Radio 4’s news reporting this morning. News came today that the political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, was killed in an Israeli attack after a strike hit a building in Iran – just hours after Israel claimed to have killed

Huw Edwards pleads guilty to making indecent images of children

From our UK edition

Ex-BBC presenter Huw Edwards has pleaded guilty to three counts of making indecent images of children. The former TV star appeared at Westminster magistrates’ court earlier today, where he admitted having 41 indecent images of children, which had been sent to him by another man on WhatsApp. The former Six O’Clock News host was suspended

Kemi Badenoch hits back at the Guardian

From our UK edition

Ding ding ding! The Tory leadership race is heating up, with the final six candidates now declared. But with Kemi Badenoch currently the bookies’ favourite to win, the Guardian has tonight published a story claiming she was guilty of ‘bullying and traumatising’ behaviour when running the Department for Business and Trade. The paper cites sources who

Labour’s war on beautiful housing

From our UK edition

Another day, another drama – and this time Sir Keir’s government is in the spotlight. In the National Planning Policy Framework published today by the Ministry of Housing, the author’s handiwork is clear for all to see. The 84-page file details more than just the government’s approach to housebuilding – it specifies exactly what deletions

Watch: Just Stop Oil stage another failed protest

From our UK edition

Uh oh. After Just Stop Oil’s failed attempt to disrupt travellers at Gatwick Airport on Monday, the eco-activist group are back at it again – now taking their bizarre spray paint antics to Heathrow instead. Two activists have this morning decided to try and disrupt more commuters by spraying some of the airport’s departure boards

How Labour U-turned on scrapping winter fuel payments

From our UK edition

Keir Starmer’s party has only been in government for three weeks – and already they’re spinning like a top. Rachel Reeves’ statement to the Commons yesterday was notable for making the kind of decisions which Labour would have castigated a Tory Chancellor for taking. Chief among them was the decision to scrap winter fuel payments for

Huw Edwards charged with making indecent images of children

From our UK edition

Back to the case of ex-BBC presenter Huw Edwards, who has this afternoon been charged with making indecent images of children. Edwards was suspended by the Beeb in July 2023 after the Sun reported allegations that he had solicited explicit images from a young man. He subsequently resigned from the Corporation in April this year, citing medical

Braverman ‘welcome to join’ Reform, says Anderson

From our UK edition

All is not well in the Tory party these days. After a tumultuous election campaign which saw infighting frequently dominate the headlines, it seems that division and instability have followed the party into opposition too. On Sunday night, Suella Braverman announced that she would not be contesting the leadership, adamant that there would be ‘no

Ex-Olympian enters Scottish Tory leadership race

From our UK edition

To Scotland, where another Tory leadership race is starting to take shape. Now a second candidate has thrown their hat into the ring as Brian Whittle MSP has today announced his bid to join the Scottish Conservative leadership race – confirming there will indeed be a contest. Game on… The former athlete told the Scotsman

Watch: Just Stop Oil tries – and fails – to cause chaos at Gatwick

From our UK edition

Just Stop Oil eco-activists took to Gatwick Airport this morning – but their attempt to disrupt summer holiday travellers appears to have failed dismally. Eight people were arrested after environmental protestors with ‘lock-on’ suitcases tried – and failed – to block departure gates. An airport spokesperson insisted Gatwick is ‘open and operating normally’. The protest

Suella Braverman bows out with a blast

From our UK edition

The Tory leadership race is hotting up and there’s lots of familiar faces featuring this time around. Kemi Badenoch, Priti Patel, Tom Tugendhat – it’s like the 2022 contest never ended! But one candidate who sadly isn’t running is Suella Braverman, the onetime standard-bearer of the Brexiteer right. She has penned a piece for Monday’s

Keir cracks the whip on his Starmtroopers

From our UK edition

As the third week of Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour government comes to an end, there’s certainly been a lot of change in town. From the party’s tone shift on private jets to the Culture Secretary’s volte face on the culture wars, the Labour party has proven it still has a penchant for U-turns. And in Westminster more specifically,

Joanna Cherry blasts SNP’s ‘culture of hate’

From our UK edition

Another day, another drama – and this time it’s the SNP in the spotlight. Ex-Edinburgh MP Joanna Cherry has taken to the august pages of Scotland’s only pro-indy newspaper, the National, to urge her party to take a long hard look at itself after its electoral wipe-out this month. Though she has insisted she ‘intends

Ousted Reform candidate chases Farage for £8,500

From our UK edition

Reform has managed to get 5 MPs elected, take 14 per cent of the vote share and outdo any other UK political party on campaign video views on Twitter – but it’s not all looking rosy for Nigel Farage right now. Before Farage decided he was going to stand in the election, Reform UK selected

Could these be the online comments of young Kemi Badenoch?

From our UK edition

The Tory leadership battle is now underway with the traditional first act: to identify a frontrunner and start blowing poison darts. Kemi Badenoch is the frontrunner and famously combative. She’s in her early 40s. So it must stand to reason that she’d have let off steam in a chatroom somewhere, surely? This is where it

Reform beat Tories among younger voters

From our UK edition

These days when it rains for the Tories, it pours. Now it transpires that more voters under the age of 30 backed Nigel Farage’s Reform UK than the Conservatives this election – with experts convinced that recent years of economic instability is pushing younger voters away from the two largest parties. How curious… Over 35,000

Davidson warns Scottish Tory split would be ‘electoral suicide’

From our UK edition

As Conservative MPs start to declare their candidacy for the Tory leadership race, north of the border conversations are heating up about who the next Scottish group leader will be. As Mr S wrote on Monday, so far the first official contender is justice spokesperson Russell Findlay – who announced his bid by penning a