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It’s hard to imagine how baffled the British public must have been by the arrival of David Bowie on to TV screens in the early 1970s. With his saffron hair, make-up and androgynous clothes, superficially he looked like a rejection of everything his post-war south London childhood had taught him. One of the most pivotal scenes in Moonage Daydream, the recent film about his life, is his 1973 interview with chat show host Russell Harty. Throughout this awkward cross-examination, Harty searches for a label he can stick on Bowie for the benefit of discomfited viewers. ‘Are those men’s shoes? Or women’s shoes? Or bisexual shoes?’ Harty inquires, looking down at Bowie’s strappy

Farewell, Truss’s twisty lectern. Last week in Downing Street Rishi Sunak used one with a straight column. If he follows recent Tory tradition, he’ll have one made to his own design, paid for by the party (£2,000-£4,000 a pop) and loaned to the government. Each lectern (from the Latin legere, ‘to read’) has sent a message. David Cameron’s was intended to look statesmanlike, a change from Labour’s tray-on-a-pole: Theresa May’s was made of cedar and designed (by her chief of staff Fiona Hill) to look more feminine: Boris Johnson went for a darker wood and a sturdier design – aides knew he was fond of thumping it during speeches: Liz Truss’s