Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike
The revolving door in No/ 10 seems to turn even faster these days, given the news that Downing Street will shortly be greeting its fourth director of communications in eight months. Amber de Botton will be next to sip from what has become widely regarded as a poisoned chalice, following the departure of Adam Jones,
He’s had his money worries in the past, but life seems to be pretty sweet for Nigel Farage right now. Less than eighteen months after announcing his retirement from frontline politics – claiming there was ‘no money’ in it – Farage’s fortunes seem to be on the up. Newly published accounts for his company, Thorn
Fire up the engine, the clickbait machine has gone into overdrive. Mr S doesn’t spend much of his time watching America’s Daily Show for obvious reasons: life is short and sermons are best delivered on a Sunday. Yet, stumbling across Monday’s episode of the late-night satirical programme, Steerpike couldn’t help but reflect on the sheer
What a first day. Just 24 hours after walking up Downing Street to enter that famous black door, Rishi Sunak was taking to the despatch box for his debut at Prime Ministers’ Questions. In an entertaining and highly-energetic exchange, the new leader signalled his willingness to make a break with the past, telling the Commons
The chorus of execration that met the appointment of Rishi Sunak as PM has been music to Steerpike’s ears. There are few things more delicious than the right-on indulging in yet another collective meltdown at the sheer audacity of a non-white politician who doesn’t conform to their views. After years of tedious games about identity politics,
Joe Biden, the man whose diet seems to consist of ice cream and gaffes, has done it again. Having managed to irritate both Boris Johnson and Liz Truss with his European interventions, ‘sleepy Joe’ seems determined to make it a hattrick of Tory premiers. The septuagenarian president was addressing a Washington event on Monday evening to
Does Nadhim Zahawi have the worst judgement in Tory politics? As recently as last year, the man could do no wrong: the boosterish vaccines minister who impressed at education, winning fans with his back story and media savvy. Yet since then, the millionaire pollster’s winning touch seems to have deserted him. Indeed, Zahawi has been
So much has happened over the last few months, that perhaps Nadhim Zahawi should be forgiven for a slight lapse in memory. The Tory MP, and former chancellor, has this morning come out to back Boris Johnson to become leader of the Conservative party and prime minister again. Zahawi wrote on Twitter: That’s strange. Has
Action stations! It’s go go go this weekend as the old campaign vehicles crank into life once more. Are you (still) ready for Rishi? A Boris backer? Or a Mordaunt man? As the three candidates scramble around to tot up their tallies of parliamentary supporters, a rather different madcap muddle is happening in associations across
What a year it’s been for Steve Baker. Fresh from leading rebellions over Brexit and Covid, the Wycombe MP joined the revolt against Boris Johnson, briefly mulled a bid to replace him before getting on board the Truss train, becoming a Northern Ireland minister and issuing an apology for the UK’s behaviour in Brexit. Now,
It was all going so well for Rishi. With a hundred MPs in the bag, Sunak looks to be the only candidate who will cruise through to the final round on Monday unlike his struggling rivals. But has Tobias Ellwood managed to pull defeat from the jaws of victory once again? The chairman of the
Does Boris have the numbers? That’s the question all Westminster is asking today. There’s been much excitement about an anonymous briefing that seems to have gone out to half the parliamentary press gallery. BBC Pol Ed Chris Mason quotes a source close to Boris Johnson as claiming that he has ‘now has more than 100
Is this the start of a new Xi Jinping purge? Earlier today, the former Chinese president Hu Jintao was manhandled and led out of the closing ceremony of the Communist party congress – watched on by delegates and the media. The 79-year-old is Xi Jinping’s immediate predecessor and was seated to his immediate left. A
And so the Liz Truss regime ends after a glorious 45 days in power. And, appropriately, in a government where humour and tragedy were so often intwined, the Daily Telegraph is now reporting that Truss intends to draw up her own resignation honours’ list after a mere six weeks in office. Below is a list
Life is pretty good right now for Sir Keir Starmer: his authority is unchallenged, his shadow cabinet is serene and his party is leading by 35 points in the polls. But this morning has seen a (temporary) disruption to all that, following the news that one of his lesser-known backbenches will be quitting parliament after
Well, that’s that. The disastrous premiership of Liz Truss will come to an end next week after 52 days in office, the shortest tenure in British political history. Who can replace her? Someone with a strong stomach, a glutton for punishment and a taste for sipping from a poisoned chalice. Below Mr S runs his
‘Who’s for the game, the biggest that’s played, the red crashing game of a fight?’ Jessie Pope’s paean to the glories of war might equally be applicable to the internecine slaughter of the Tory party as its MPs gear up for yet another brutal leadership battle. But in war you can only be killed once; in
As the man who quite literally wrote the book on Churchill, Boris Johnson will be all too keen to encourage talk of a comeback. There’s much excited talk in the corridors of power about whether the former premier really can mount a comeback, just four months after leaving in disgrace. Lists of MPs are being
Embattled, humiliated and lampooned, Liz Truss has few public allies left. And she certainly has one less after today, following the suspension of Jason Stein, her acting director of communications in No. 10. Stein is a longtime supporter who managed much of Truss’s press operations during the summer leadership campaign. But shortly before PMQs the
It’s the age-old dilemma for a media advisor when your politician is in a jam. How do you get out of doing an interview you really don’t want to do? Liz Truss’s former spad Kirsty Buchanan gave us an answer to that question to this morning when she revealed to the Whitehall Sources podcast just