A cunning apprentice

I’m becoming increasingly intrigued by Katie Hopkins, the contestant on The Apprentice who has emerged as a national hate figure. (See Richard Curtis’s aside during his Bafta Fellowship speech.)

On last night’s show, in which the six remaining contestants had to sell merchandise on a home shopping channel, Katie was so outrageously snobbish about the channel’s typical customer — whom she dubbed “Mavis” — it seems clear that her whole appearance on the show is some kind of publicity stunt. Another reason for thinking this is that she seems too intelligent — too essentially competent — to be bothering to jump through all these hoops merely to secure a job with Alan Sugar. What kind of publicity stunt, though?

Option one is that she’s just a freelance publicity-seeker. This was the verdict of Heat editor Mark Frith on The Apprentice after-show yesterday.