Some good news at last for Damian Green. Theresa May’s onetime deputy has had a difficult few weeks what with his unsuccessful selection bid in Ashfield followed by the news that his nemesis Sue Gray is off to run Keir Starmer’s office. But Mr S hears that Green last night had a bit of good luck: the team he captained triumphed at the Tory away day pub quiz, thanks in no small part to the efforts of one Michael Gove.
The brightest minds in the parliamentary party were grilled on subjects from ‘great Conservative election wins’ to ‘great Labour scandals’, ‘Lib Dem failures’ to the ‘zeitgeist tape (for those who’ve had enough of politics).’ Questions included which Labour frontbencher once said Mao ‘did more good than harm’ – answer: Diane Abbott, the length of convicted ex-MP Jared O’Mara’s sentence, and the price of Angela Rayner’s Airpods. The tiebreaker question was, appropriately, ‘which well-known ABBA song was first performed at a gala to mark the wedding of the King of Sweden to his wife Queen Silvia in 1976?’ Answer: Dancing Queen. One for Theresa May perhaps…
Along with the fun came serious sessions too. Isaac Levido, the mastermind of the 2019 triumph, showed the MPs polling which suggested that an electoral triumph next time is ‘implausible but not impossible’ in the words of one attendee. Levido suggested that the Tories would have won 282 seats in December if an election had been held then. Former Tory leader Michael Howard was on hand as the guest speaker to entertain the attendees about the realities of life in opposition. And the after dinner speech was given by Andrew Strauss, prompting plenty of cricketing metaphors. Howzat?
Two topics of conversation dominated the day though. The first was Boris Johnson’s lunchtime speech in Westminster in which he poured cold water on Rishi Sunak’s deal. Such an intervention seems to have gone done badly with most of those at the away day – though this was something of a self-selecting crowd. One MP told Steerpike that ‘Boris isn’t here but it feels like he’s throwing grenades’, adding, ‘If I was advising Boris I would have told him to sit it out.’ And just three hours after that speech came the news about Sue Gray – whose planned appointment sparked ‘real anger’ in the room when it was announced. The prospect of the Partygate prober-in-chief marshalling the Starmer Army in government is ‘nuts’ according to one Tory backbencher.
Talk about an incentive to win the next election and deny her the role…
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