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
Oh dear. Although Lord Ashcroft said he would be pleasantly surprised if Anthony Seldon’s biography of David Cameron offered anything more than ‘a sanitised account’ of his time in Number 10, an excerpt in today’s Mail on Sunday should make interesting reading for Boris Johnson. In Cameron at 10, Seldon writes of tensions between the leadership hopeful and the Cameron
It’s fair to say that the appointment of Ed Miliband’s ex-campaign director Spencer Livermore to the House of Lords hasn’t gone down well in Labour circles. Harriet Harman was said to be in a battle to get a similar honour for her own press chief Ayesha Hazarika if Livermore got one, but her name was
It’s official, Jeremy Corbyn has made it. Following in the lines of all the greats, the left wing messiah has inspired such fan devotion that people are genuinely bidding on items just because he may have touched them. The item in question is a a coffee cup that his lips allegedly once met: The seller
The 2015 Dissolution Peerages have been announced today, following much rumour about who might receive one. While Mr S’s colleague Sebastian Payne has the full list over on Coffee House, it’s safe to say the appointments haven’t done much to improve public opinion of the honours system; former spads and out-of-work politicians make up a large chunk of the list. But
Given that the general election proved disastrous for the Liberal Democrats, it’s surprising how many party members seem keen to revisit the experience. With Vince Cable and Norman Baker both bringing out books just in time for this year’s Lib Dem conference, reports have surfaced claiming that Nick Clegg has finally agreed to write a book. Although this
Although Buzzfeed managed to successfully register a cat to vote in the Labour leadership election, the party remains insistent that they are successfully weeding out ‘supporters’ who are not genuine. However, in a sign that they may not have quite as good a grasp on these checks as claimed, it turns out that they are asking school
A time will come when the Guardian declares war on your favourite food. The lefty bible has so far deemed HP sauce to be the condiment of ‘the establishment’, tea drinkers to be on the same level as ‘colonialism and the class system’ and barbecues to be approaching racist. Now, the Sunday roast has had its
Despite becoming a Cybernat target during the Scottish referendum after she donated £1 million to the Better Together campaign, J.K. Rowling has not been deterred from putting Scottish Nationalists in their place. Such an opportunity arose today, after a Yes voter came up with a rather tenuous reason as to why they would continue the fight for Scottish independence: liberating Scotland from
Andy Burnham’s leadership bid hit a stumbling block this morning. Burnham — who bills himself as both the anti-Westminster candidate and the candidate who can unite the party in Westminster — made a slip when asked whether he agreed that it would be great for the party to have a female candidate. Speaking on Radio 5
With reports starting to claim that the next global financial crisis is on the horizon, one could be forgiven for thinking it’s all doom and gloom. So Steerpike was cheered to see that Labour’s former king of spin Damian McBride is on hand to put everyone’s minds at rest. McBride says that he has been preparing for the day
Louise Mensch has once again become the subject of much ridicule online over something she has tweeted. The incident occurred last night after the former Tory MP claimed Jeremy Corbyn’s supporters — who have recently been accused of being anti-semitic — were insulting Corbyn’s Labour leadership rival Liz Kendall. Mensch claimed that Twitter’s autocomplete function showed that the most common
Although Tatler received a boost to its readership following the BBC’s ‘Posh People: Inside Tatler’, a fly-on-the-wall documentary about the magazine, for some ‘posh people’ the society bible has long been essential reading. One such man who fits this description is none other than the current Chancellor of the Exchequer. Thanks to Tatler‘s Bystander archive, Mr S
If you thought Corbynmania was limited to female obsession and male politicians growing their facial hair, it’s time to think again. It turns out that Jeremy Corbyn is also inspiring poets everywhere. Steerpike has been sent a copy of a new collection of poems edited by Russell Bennetts, which includes poems by 22 authors who have been
Oh dear. Andy Burnham’s efforts of late to appeal to Jeremy Corbyn’s left-wing voters may have gone to waste after an email blip this morning. Steerpike understands that he has risked the wrath of one of the unions after an official looking email was circulated to members of Unite, the trade union, urging them to vote for Burnham.
This summer a new craze has taken hold of several politicians. Inspired by the frenzy Jeremy Corbyn’s ‘world weary sea dog’ beard has caused amongst women, both Ed Vaizey and David Gauke grew their facial hair in the style of the Labour leadership favourite. Now it appears Ed Miliband may have jumped on the bandwagon. The
First Russell Brand, and now Rupert Murdoch has joined the list of ‘endorsements Jeremy Corbyn might not actually want’. The News UK media mogul, whose papers backed the Tories in the general election, says that Corbyn is the only Labour leadership candidate who actually believes in something: Corbyn increasingly likely Labor winner. Seems only candidate who believes
Jeremy Corbyn has been having a difficult time of late. The Labour leadership favourite has become increasingly tetchy with the media after facing questions about his links to a Holocaust denier, as well as being the subject of criticism from a host of former Labour bigwigs. However, there is one man who he can rely on to fight his
After the Queen’s Speech in May, a number of Labour MPs including Chuka Umunna and Rachel Reeves enjoyed a group trip to Nandos. Alas the invite didn’t manage to make its way to blunder-prone Lucy Powell who took to Twitter to awkwardly point this out. Now it seems Ed Miliband’s former deputy campaign chief has put
In an interview with Labour Uncut, Andy Burnham admitted a dark secret: that throughout the 90s he lived in fear that his early-career journalism gigs — from his time working for B2B magazines — would wind their way onto Have I Got News for You. He recently repeated his reason for not going on the programme
With MPs being awarded a 10 per cent pay rise this summer, politicians have been left having to defend their annual salary of £74,00o from sceptics who point out that the boost comes at a time when their constituents face tough cuts. Still, Mr S wonders whether that number is too small an estimate after one takes into account all