Steerpike

Scottish government-backed quango Creative Scotland is back in the limelight over its porn project controversy. As Mr S wrote in March, the director of a hardcore pornographic performance, ‘Rein’, managed to secure £85,000 of taxpayers' cash for her rather, um, explicit work. Now it can be revealed that, despite officials denying full knowledge of the show's contents before this point, Creative Scotland was in fact aware of the show's plans to include ‘non-simulated sex acts’ a year before signing off on the hefty sum.

Well, well, well. Rishi Sunak's immigration plans have been met with a fairly underwhelming response in Britain – only a quarter of people believe the Rwanda scheme will work, while the PM has faced some rather public dissent from within his own ranks over his record on small boats. But the Rwanda policy does in fact have some political admirers – in the form of leaders from across the Continent. Finally a piece of good news for the PM... Austria’s Chancellor Karl Nehammer is the latest European politician to heap praise on Rishi’s Rwanda plan. At a press conference in Vienna this morning, Nehammer hailed Britain as a ‘pioneer’ on migration, telling journalists: Asylum proceedings should happen in safe third countries.

In the aftermath of the tainted blood scandal, there is no shortage of blame to go around – but some are more culpable than others. As a junior health minister from 1982 to 1985, Ken Clarke was at the heart of Whitehall as reports of the risks from blood transfusion began to be published. According to Sir Brian Langstaff's inquiry, by 1982 there was evidence that infections were occurring through imported blood products. The Department of Health even admitted it was 'likely' that HIV/Aids was transmitted through blood products. Yet still in 1983 Lord Clarke continued to say that there was 'no conclusive proof' of infection via this route. Sir Brian says that while this was 'technically correct', its use was 'indefensible' because: It did not spell out the real risk.

Once upon a time, the Bank of England was headed by a series of anonymous figures, whose identities remained largely unknown to the public. Yet now, in the age of the Monetary Policy Committee, the Governor and his team have become familiar figures in the financial world – thanks partly to Liz Truss's regular swipes at Andrew Bailey et al. So it is perhaps no surprise then that the BoE has stepped up its spending on social media – with even Bailey making a guest appearance on the Bank's TikTok account. So keen is the Bank to promote its work online that it has just shelled out £2,417 on equipment to 'create content for our new Instagram profile.

Jeremy Corbyn is back in the spotlight again, causing yet more issues for his former party. The ex-Labour leader who at one point fancied his chances of becoming Britain’s prime minister currently sits as an Independent MP after his suspension four years ago. Now, however, he faces being excluded from the party for good. Talk about a fall from grace... Suspended from Labour in 2020 after he rejected the findings of an Equality and Human Rights report on antisemitism in the party, Corbyn has remained Islington North's Independent MP ever since.

Oh dear. It seems that the Eurocrats of Brussels have blundered again. Following the news of the Iranian president's death, most western governments have chosen to keep a dignified silence. Hardly a surprise, perhaps, given that President Raisi was, in the words of Sky News, the 'man who launched the first direct attack on Israel in his country's history and a hardliner on whose watch hundreds of Iranians have been killed in the brutal repression of recent women-led protests.' Not necessarily the kind of person who necessarily inspires the warmest of tributes from self-described democrats then. So it was to some surprise that Charles Michel, the President of the European Council, has used this occasion to issue a heartfelt tribute to the man known as the 'Butcher of Tehran.