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
David Cameron has this afternoon had a ‘full and frank’ discussion with European Council president Herman Van Rompuy about the candidacy of Jean-Claude Juncker for president of the European Commission. What does ‘full and frank’ mean? According to this picture, it involved the PM demanding a vote on the appointment from behind his hand. Not
Applications to become Chairman of the BBC Trust close on Friday. Plenty of noise was made early on the race about the need for a totally committed successor, after Chris Patten stood accused of not giving the £110,000 a year job his full attention. The official job specification published by the Cabinet Office stated: ‘The
It’s a row that won’t go away, after Mr S revealed yesterday that the PM had labelled Dominic Cummings a ‘career psychopath’, Michael Gove’s former special adviser has hit back, blogging: “At the PolEx party (18/6), Cameron said that I am a ‘career psychopath’. A) No10′s first reaction was to decide not to react to my
Former CIA director and US Army General David Petraeus is in town hosted by the Henry Jackson Society. But that’s classified. For some reason Petraeus is being very shy in front of journalists (well, most journalists). The event in the House of Commons this afternoon is being held under the Chatham House Rule. All media,
There must be an election in the offing because the PM was out and about last night looking for a manifesto. He addressed Policy Exchange’s (PX) annual summer bash in Westminster College Gardens. It was a gag a minute. He cracked rotten jokes about pig semen, and claimed that he was one of the founders of
Farewell then, Jeremy Paxman. The veteran broadcaster bows out of Newsnight tonight. Mr S has compiled his favourite Paxo moments: The infamous Michael Howard interview is foremost in the extensive genre of politicians not answering the question: Chloe Smith, who was a high-flying Tory Minister at the time, never recovered from this encounter with Paxo in 2012: It’s
Iranian president Hassan Rouhani has a long way to go if he is serious about his awkward watching sport photographs. Proud of our boys who secured our first point–hopefully the first of many more to come. #WorldCup2014 #TeamMelli pic.twitter.com/9pzyT1Dr3f — Hassan Rouhani (@HassanRouhani) June 16, 2014 Last night’s effort was a good start, but he
Helen Goodman, the Labour MP for Bishop Auckland in Durham, was born in Nottinghamshire and brought up in Derbyshire, so you would have thought that she might take extra care to brush up on her local knowledge of Durham to avoid accusations of ‘carpet-bagging’. The Northern Echo gleefully reports: ‘The village of Ingleton is so
Mr Steerpike can exclusively reveal that former Deputy Speaker Nigel Evans is to run for a senior position on the 1922 Committee executive. The recently vindicated Tory MP remains popular on the backbenches, and has been keeping a deliberately high profile since being cleared on nine counts of sexual abuse. The all-powerful committee is the repository
There are two types of Australian male: the ‘julios’, a modern import who likes soft drinks and hair product, and the ‘nerds’, the traditional breed who like beer and Sheilas. Tony Abbott is a nerd. On his recent visit to America, Abbott could not have done less to counter national stereotypes. The customised surfboard he
Ed Miliband’s change of mind over The Sun took Mr Steerpike by surprise, brandishing the newspaper that so many of his colleagues have spent today condemning. This has, of course, inspired various spoofs on Twitter. But Mr S can assure readers that the image below is 120 per cent genuine – and bears a message
In celebration of their special ’This Is Our England’ World Cup paper (which has 22 million free copies being distributed for free), The Sun has managed to persuade senior politicians to pose with today’s edition. Boris Johnson, David Cameron and Nick Clegg all managed to look normal. But Ed Miliband on the other hand… This
The Chancellor’s economic brain, Rupert Harrison, looked distinctly restless last night, sipping champagne in John Maynard Keynes’s drawing room. Osborne’s chief-of-staff, the architect the evil Tory austerity, did not seem entirely comfortable as he stood beneath an imposing mounted copy of The General Theory. This awkward tableau came about thanks to the launch of a book about the
He lent his name to the infamous inquiry that has strangled Britain’s free press, but Mr Steerpike was pleased to see that Sir Brian Leveson does not wholly practice what he preaches. At least not in front of Her Majesty the Queen that is. Mr S attended a garden party at Buckingham Palace yesterday afternoon,
Mr S has oft remarked that you have only made it in life when someone has named a watering hole after you. So congratulations to the Mayor of London, who has joined this elite club thanks to the Japanese-style South Bank spot ‘Izakaya Boris’, translates as ‘Boris Tavern’. Situated in County Hall, the old fiefdom of Boris’s sworn enemy Ken Livingstone,
You would normally have to pay thousands of pounds for the pleasure, but Mr S and the Westminster hack pack were treated to a Gordon Brown speech for free on Monday lunchtime. In a rare Westminster sighting, the former Prime Minister had his gawky fake smile glued in place as he reflected on his tumultuous relationship
It’s safe to say that the Tories are very pleased with their ground effort in last week’s Newark by-election, with praise heaped on those that put the hard slog in: From: Government Chief Whip Subject: Newark UPDATE Dear Colleague, Many thanks to the 86 colleagues who have made at least three trips to Newark (and
Labour’s John Woodcock is being teased mercilessly by his colleagues. A recent fundraising event which he organised was secretly recorded – and embarrassing quotes from fellow Labour MPs and candidates, who thought they were speaking behind closed doors, leaked out. Woodcock should know about the sort of dirty-tricks that the parties play on each other.
Husbands and wives across London gathered last night to hear Tim Dowling’s informed advice on How to be a Husband. At last night’s launch of his book of that title, Dowling told Mr S that marriage isn’t dissimilar from flying in a police helicopter – a task he’d confronted earlier in the day. ‘You get
Nadine Dorries’s novel, Four Streets, may have been unilaterally panned by the critics, with the Telegraph’s Christopher Howse labelling it the ‘the worst novel I’ve read in 10 years’, but Nadine’s first official journey into fiction has been a runaway success. It spent the last 43 days in the top 100 Kindle books on Amazon,
