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A year ago, I sang ‘Ye Banks and Braes’ by Robert Burns at the annual Scottish banquet at Manhattan’s University Club. Afterwards, my dinner partner, an American chap, asked me what it was about. Regret, I said. Just look at the last line. But my false lover stole my rose [virginity]. And ah! He left
George Osborne has returned to his old ways this week – flying to Davos as part of a contingent of Citizens of Nowhere who have made the luxury Swiss resort their home for the week. Only this year the global elite have been joined by some guests who could not be described as your typical attendee.
In the same song where the brilliant lyricist Ian Dury gave the world the couplet, ‘I could be a writer with a growing reputation/ I could be the ticket-man at Fulham Broadway station’, his narrator speaks of ‘first-night nerves every one-night stand’. Perhaps we are now more accustomed to one-night stand referring to a casual sexual liaison,
This piece first appeared in this week’s Spectator magazine. Recently the NHS postponed a large number of non-urgent operations to cope with what is known as the ‘annual winter crisis’. Naturally, this outcome was treated as a scandal in the press, and there were predictable calls for Jeremy Hunt to resign. But the fact that
The Financial Times investigation into a men-only charity dinner where hostesses were allegedly groped has sent shockwaves through Westminster today. Government minister Nadhim Zahawi has found himself in the hot seat over his attendance (he says he left early), while David Meller, a co-chair of the Presidents Club behind the event, has quit his non-executive role on
Boris Johnson came up early in PMQs. The Cabinet’s new ‘shadow chancellor’ has called for extra money – five billion quid – to be lavished on the NHS. Jeremy Corbyn asked Mrs May if she agreed. She dustily replied that the real chancellor had promised more than five billion last autumn. He’d pledged six! Six billion
Surprise guests at this year’s Davos include Donald Trump and John McDonnell. But fear not, there’s still the usual citizens of nowhere. David Cameron and George Osborne have upped (ski) sticks and headed to the luxury Swiss resort for the week. Unfortunately for the former Prime Minister, he appears to have been caught out by
The Presidents Club dinner is not the type of event to which I tend to be invited and neither do I suspect I would go were I to be asked – although in truth that is as much down to my native tightfistedness as to the reports of boorish behaviour from this year’s event. I
Jeremy Corbyn has learnt from last week’s PMQs where Theresa May simply stood up and said she wasn’t going to answer as he hadn’t asked a question. His first two questions were short, sharp and to the point. He began by asking Theresa May if she agreed with Boris Johnson that the NHS needed an
What, you might well ask, could possibly make the situation in Syria look much worse, after President Erdogan’s assault on the Kurds in Afrin? The Turks are, obviously, attacking the forces that did most of the heavy lifting when it came to dealing with Isis on the ground. Indeed, If it hadn’t been for the
During the government’s crunch negotiations with Brussels to get ‘sufficient progress’ before Christmas, nervous Brexiteers began to worry that Theresa May was about to give too much away. Jacob Rees-Mogg used a question at PMQs to warn the Prime Minister that her Brexit red lines were ‘beginning to look a little bit pink’. He urged
David Davis is no stranger to accusations that he has dodged Parliamentary scrutiny over Brexit. This morning though, there was no getting out of an appearance in front of the Brexit select committee. Fortunately for the Brexit secretary however, he was briefly rescued during a tricky exchange about transitional arrangements when his phone went off. Davis
Prince Harry’s imminent wedding to Meghan Markle will reinvigorate the dying special relationship between Britain and America. It is a boost for the fading American regard for the monarchy. In America, the mother country is increasingly the forgotten country – and it has been fading for a century, ever since the First World War. As
Boris Johnson was reportedly humiliated in yesterday’s cabinet following his demand for more money for the NHS. If it was the Prime Minister’s intention to embarrass Boris Johnson it was a mistake, says the Times. In its editorial, the paper calls the ministerial discussions ‘an exercise in staged humiliation rather than consensus-building’. The PM may
Compared to previous instances in US history when political paralysis and dysfunction shut down Washington for weeks at a time, the three-day government shutdown that ended on Monday was a rather mundane and unremarkable occurrence. Indeed, unlike the 21-day saga in 1995-1996 between President Bill Clinton and House Republicans or the 16-day clash between House
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The Archbishop of Canterbury has once again been dragged into a battle between traditionalists and modernisers. This time though it’s not about gay marriage or women bishops, but the tattered reputation of one of the Church of England’s most-celebrated figures, Bishop George Bell. Justin Welby was sorely mistaken if he hoped commissioning an independent report
The UK government has today announced plans to establish a new unit to counter ‘fake news’. This will serve as a ‘dedicated national security communications unit’ which aims to combat ‘disinformation by state actors and others’. Announcing the move, the Prime Minister’s spokesman said: ‘we are living in an era of fake news and competing
Theresa May does seem to lose more authority with each week. A reshuffle in which people refuse to move, followed by Cabinet ministers using the media to ask for more money for the NHS and defence. But does this make her more likely to go soon? That the Prime Minister is weak has been priced
Rather than re-energise the Tory party as intended, Theresa May’s new year reshuffle just exposed her weaknesses and managed to annoy a lot of Conservative MPs in the process. What’s more, Mr S understands there is another undesired consequence. Two weeks on and Downing Street is yet to fill a host of special advisor vacancies.
After a prolonged dry spell, the Donald, to borrow from Billy Bush’s memorable taped remark, has finally scored again. For the past week, Trump has been buffeted by revelations in the appropriately named In Touch magazine about his alleged dalliance with the porn star Stormy Daniels. Melania is reportedly so incensed that she will no
Reading Melanie Phillips in this morning’s Times made me really cross. Nothing unusual in that – except I’m cross because I agreed with every word she had to say about free speech, and the lunatic attacks on Canadian academic Jordan Peterson by activists who have the gall to call themselves progressive. Peterson, in case you
Cabinet today was not the dramatic showdown over NHS funding that some expected. Boris Johnson was, unsurprisingly given that Theresa May knew what he wanted to say, not called on to speak first. Those Ministers who went before him emphasised that it would be better if these debates took place in private, not public. When
‘Is Boris preparing to flounce out of the cabinet?’ Not my question, but that of one of his senior ministerial colleagues. Why could that be? Exhibit A. In this morning’s cabinet, he is hijacking Jeremy Hunt’s update about how hospitals are coping with the winter pressures with a headline grabbing and overtly populist demand for
Oh dear. On Monday night, the Prime Minister attempted to show her support for the union by throwing a Burns Night supper at No. 10. Although Theresa May gave a short address at the inaugural event, Steerpike understands it fell to David Mundell – the Scottish Secretary – to address the haggis (a ‘crispy haggis’, served
That’s a question I never thought I’d ask. Women shouldn’t need to be patronised by creating a special class of system to run for election. But with the announcement of the Conservative Government’s PPS list yesterday I was shocked to note that only 8 out of 43 appointments were women. That’s a mere 18.6 percent
Ukip has defied predictions about its death before. Yet even the party’s most ardent supporters would find it hard not to feel gloomy about recent events and the party’s downward spiral. Ukip’s leader Henry Bolton clings on, despite losing a vote of no confidence and suffering a raft of resignations among his top team. ‘Is
There is no doubt about it, getting a divorce is an expensive business. The average cost, according to Aviva’s Family Finances report, is £14,500 – which includes legal fees, child custody costs and changing homes. The report highlights how the cost of divorce has spiralled a further 17% since 2014 when divorces in the UK
As Jeremy Corbyn’s grip over the Labour party tightens, the threat of deselection for more moderate Labour MPs who do not toe the party line is increasing. Labour MPs who are concerned about their futures may be looking for ways to fight back. I can offer one example of how this can be done, from
Suppose you were a white supremacist who wanted to keep Muslim children down. Or suppose you were a Machiavellian middle-class parent, who wanted to handicap the competition your child would face when the race for university places began. In either case, you would be delighted by what is happening at St Stephen’s primary school in Newham.
A woman and a man had a conversation. Other people watched and listened. The woman asked the man some questions. The man answered them. Some people liked his answers. Some people didn’t. Some people liked the woman’s questions. Some people didn’t. So some of them called her a bitch and a whore and talked about
There’s renewed speculation in Westminster that Britain might end up staying in the customs union. The CBI is calling for the UK to stay in a customs union with the EU and Labour is expected to move to backing customs union membership soon. The argument goes that because customs union membership does not require free
Are young women stupid? Apparently, 15 per cent of them would miss a cervical smear appointment for a gym class or waxing appointment. These strange upside-down priorities are outlined in a study of 2,017 women published by charity Jo’s Cervical Cancer Trust, which also found that two thirds of those surveyed weren’t aware they were
Ukip’s leader Henry Bolton is under mounting pressure to step down following the scandal over his model girlfriend’s racist text messages. Bolton – the party’s sixth leader in 16 months – lost a vote of no confidence yesterday. He has vowed to stick it out, insisting that he will not resign as party leader. But