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
It’s been a long time coming, but the Corbynite MP, Chris Williamson, has finally been suspended from Labour following his comments about anti-Semitism in the Party this week. The suspension follows the emergence of a video yesterday which showed Williamson speaking at a Sheffield Momentum event, saying that Labour had been ‘too apologetic’ for anti-Semitism.
In November last year, Theresa May was hauled in front of the Liaison Committee (a super committee made up of the chairs of other select committees) to be grilled about her Brexit strategy. It’s fair to say that it didn’t go particularly well for the Prime Minister, who faced barbed questions from the likes of
Labour’s shift towards a second referendum has not gone down well with the party’s MP for Vauxhall. So will Kate Hoey be joining the gang of defectors and throwing her lot in with the Independent Group? Don’t bet on it. Hoey said she had no plans to sign up with what she called ‘that little
Brexit is confusing for the best of us, but Mr S. would hope that the Home Secretary would at least manage to stay abreast of the latest developments of Britain’s withdrawal from the EU. Unfortunately not. Popping up in front of MPs at the Home Affairs Committee, ‘The Saj’ got in a muddle when asked
This evening Jacob Rees-Mogg joined Rod Liddle in being able to say he has sold out the London Palladium for a Spectator event. The arch-Brexiteer appeared before a packed crowd – of over 2,000 – for an in conversation with editor Fraser Nelson. Despite a busy day in the Commons on Brexit and a spot on
Shortly after she came to power, Theresa May’s stilted delivery, robotic responses and inability to answer even the simplest of questions led to her being dubbed the Maybot. It is a name which has stuck with the PM ever since. But now it seems as if May has undergone a startling transition: from Maybot to Meerbot.
In yet another dramatic twist in the Brexit saga, Jeremy Corbyn announced this evening that Labour would now back a public vote on the outcome of the Brexit deal – albeit with some major caveats. His decision to support a second referendum has been met with delight by Remain supporting Labour MPs, who have been
The TIGgers will be hoping to spark an immediate bounce of interest today as they hold their inaugural meeting as a ‘party’. However, it seems cracks are already beginning to appear amongst the newfound chums. Until now, the only thing the Independent Group seemed able to agree on, beyond a desire for a People’s Vote,
Theresa May flew to Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh yesterday to meet with EU leaders and to desperately seek a compromise on the backstop which she can take back home to her MPs. But it appears in her efforts to win over the EU’s hearts, May might be taking a rather unorthodox approach to the negotiations. Last night,
When it comes to Brexit, the New York Times has a track record in prophesying doom and gloom. Last year, the paper’s coverage included the suggestion that everyone in London was eating boiled mutton and porridge until a few years ago and that nervous citizens are stockpiling food for a Brexit emergency, Mr S. is saddened but not
It’s Andrew Adonis’s birthday and how better for him to mark the occasion than with a tweet about Brexit? Adonis, who has busied himself as chief cheerleader for the campaign to stop Brexit, took to Twitter today to deliver his verdict on how he thought momentum towards a second referendum had grown beyond all doubt:
Derek Hatton’s journey from Militant councillor to not-quite Labour member has been something of a rollercoaster in recent days. After being banned for 32 years for being part of the Militant tendency, it was revealed that Hatton had been readmitted to the party on Monday. Two days later, Labour said that he had been suspended
Mr Steerpike has a great degree of sympathy with those who have been trying to keep up with Labour’s contorted Brexit position. First the party had its six tests – designed to be impossible to fulfil, then five demands – set out in a letter to the prime minister, and now a confusing hodgepodge of
After the dramatic announcement this morning that Heidi Allen, Anna Soubry and Sarah Wollaston were quitting the Conservative party to join the newly formed Independent Group, all three sidled over to a press conference in Westminister this afternoon to explain why they had chosen to leave. In her explanatory speech, People’s Vote backing Anna Soubry
George Galloway has just waded into Labour’s anti-Semitism row and it is safe to say his intervention won’t do much to calm things down. The firebrand former politician said the claims of anti-Semitism agains the Labour party were a lie – and he then compared the Sky News journalist interviewing him to Josef Goebbels. Here’s what
It’s been a week of bad news for the Labour Party, after eight of its MPs announced they were leaving to form their own splinter group. But if the party was hoping to show that it wasn’t dominated by far-left ideologues, news tonight suggests the party is heading down an altogether different path. Derek Hatton,
Angela Smith unwittingly became the story of the day yesterday when she referred to people of a ‘funny tinge’ on the BBC’s Politics Live. Smith apologised – but still the story is dragging on. Today, the MP was asked to explain her comments, and she came up with a new excuse: she was tired. Here’s
The Independent Group is only a few hours old but already one of its leading members has made a blunder on air. Talking about race on the BBC’s Politics Live, Angela Smith said: ‘It’s not just about being black or a funny…tin…from the BME community’ Oh dear. Angela Smith has since apologised for her comments,
Jeremy Corbyn’s supporters in the Labour party have been on the defensive today, following the announcement that a group of moderate MPs have defected from the party. In particular, the Independent Group’s scathing description of Labour as ‘institutionally anti-Semitic’ has left many worried that the charge may harm their electoral chances. But if the Labour
Oh dear. When Chuka Umunna announced that he and six other Labour MPs were leaving their party and forming ‘The Independent Group’, as a new separate political faction, he said that the TIGs would have an extremely simple message: ‘Politics is broken. It doesn’t have to be this way. Let’s change it.’ But if politics