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
Amid rumours that parliamentary bosses are mulling the closure of MPs’ favourite bar, Mr S is pleased to report that some traditions remain intact. An advert appeared last week on the government contracts website for the ‘provision of frozen desserts and afternoon tea sweet selection.’ The body demanding this service? None other than the mother
It has been a tough few years for Emmanuel Macron. Elected on a tidal wave of optimism in 2017, the famously fickle French public has since soured towards the country’s youngest ever president. The ‘yellow vest’ movement, continued Islamist extremism and now the Covid pandemic have all damaged Macron’s approval ratings, which have hovered around the -20 mark
Professor Devi Sridhar has been rarely off Scottish television screens during the pandemic. The Edinburgh academic has become something of an SNP pin-up owing to her membership of the Scottish government’s Covid advisory group. In this capacity she has repeatedly lobbied for more Holyrood powers which she claimed were necessary to stop the spread of coronavirus – powers that
It has been a bruising afternoon for the BBC in the House of Commons. An urgent question was granted on the findings of the Dyson report into the Martin Bashir affair and the subsequent cover up of how Panorama obtained its Princess Diana interview in 1995. Tory MP after Tory MP has queued up to
Valerie Vaz’s month goes from bad to worse. The Labour MP was one of just two frontbenchers sacked by Keir Starmer a fortnight ago in the wake of the party’s Hartlepool defeat. The surprise move prompted political journalists to joke that sacking Vaz as shadow leader of the House had been just the response red wall voters
Word reaches Steerpike of a dastardly plot to rob MPs of their favourite watering hole. The Strangers’ Bar is located in the heart of the Palace of Westminster and has been plying honourable members with subsidised booze for generations. But now parliamentary bosses are feared to be considering the closure or dramatic overhaul of Strangers, under the pretext
After the UK finished bottom of Eurovision on Saturday, you might have thought British hopeful James Newman was the big loser of the night. But step forward, Rhiannon Spear, SNP Greater Pollok representative, who managed to embarrass her newly re-elected party with a late night display of classlessness. The SNP’s national women’s convenor posted: ‘It’s ok
It has not been a happy week for the BBC. The corporation has spent the last four days grappling with the fall out from Lord Dyson’s damning report into the Martin Bashir affair and Prince William’s angry response. Now a fresh controversy has blown up in the BBC Monitoring unit. Digital journalist Tala Halawa has
There have been few constants in British politics this past decade but Sir Graham Brady has been one of them. Elected chairman of the 1922 committee of backbench Tory MPs in 2010, Brady has served continually ever since – barring a brief moment of madness to consider a leadership bid back in the crazy days
Mr S enjoyed the spectacle of the SNP’s orotund Westminster Ian Blackford claiming at this week’s PMQs that he is a ‘member of Scotland’s crofter community.’ The Edinburgh-born ex-banker provoked much laughter with the claim about his smallholding which he cited to justify an attack on Boris Johnson for ‘planning to throw our farmers and crofters under the Brexit bus.’ A
With the Holyrood elections now over, Nicola Nicola Sturgeon has resumed her previous habit of fronting daily Covid press conferences – except, err, when it is convenient that she doesn’t appear. Beginning today’s briefing, Sturgeon referred to the ‘so-called Indian variant’ and declared she would call it by another name: From now on, I will refer to that
Just days after appearing on a podcast in which he called America’s first amendment ‘bonkers‘ Prince Harry has now popped up again in another interview with Oprah Winfrey. Back in March, in his infamous joint interview with Meghan Markle, Harry told the media mogul that Prince Charles had cut off all communication with him but
It has not been a happy day for those in Broadcasting House. An inquiry into Martin Bashir’s 1995 Panorama interview with Princess Diana has concluded the BBC ‘fell short of its high standards of integrity and transparency’ and that Bashir acted in a ‘deceitful’ way by faking documents to obtain the sit down chat. Judge Lord Dyson found
It has been an eventful years for Lord Nazir Ahmed. Created a life peer on the recommendation of Tony Blair back in 1998, the noble Lord repaid the favour by becoming one of Blair’s most vociferous foreign policy critics, claiming that the government had tapped his phone and that the suicide bombers of 7/7 had
For several years now New Zealand Jacinda Ardern has enjoyed the status of being one of the world’s leading liberal icons. The popular premier has backed progressive policies like bereavement leave for miscarriage, gun control reforms and tackling period poverty. Her handling of the pandemic – completely shutting the country off from the rest of the
Pro-Palestine rallies were held across the country at the weekend amid the deteriorating situation in the Middle East. Onetime Labour leader turned independent backbencher Jeremy Corbyn was the star attraction at the London shindig, waving a rose to his adoring fans just yards away from a ten foot inflatable caricature with devil horns and maniacal red
George Eustice has not enjoyed an easy time since being elevated to the Cabinet last year. The environment secretary has had a lot on his plate with the Brexit fall out, pesticide squabbles, a department dominated by Goldsmith allies and near-endless rows about free trade deals impacting Britain’s food. This week a Cabinet row over talks
Amid much gloom in Westminster over the threat posed by the new Covid Indian variant, Mr S was intrigued to hear a counter blast of optimism this morning from an unlikely source – Professor Neil Ferguson. The epidemiologist appeared on Radio 4’s Today programme in which he said that this new strain appears to be less transmissible
Oh dear. Labour’s unofficial collector of titles Angela Rayner popped up in the Commons today to attack the government over its supposed ‘Covid cronyism’. Ministers such as Priti Patel have been accused of improperly helping to secure PPE contracts last year. Unfortunately for Rayner her opponent at the dispatch box was none other than the redoubtable Penny
Pitch: a struggling politician eager to make his mark. He’s 10 points behind in the polls, leading a fractitious party and struggling to prove he is the charismatic, dynamic and likeable leader his country needs. From where does he seek salvation? That time-honoured tradition of the fly on the wall documentary. Such an outlandish proposal could soon