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
Steerpike is back in this week’s edition of The Spectator. With union barons in the news, it’s the perfect time to reveal their expensive tastes: The wine waiters at Claridges are taking a keen interest in the investigation into malpractice in Falkirk. And they’re hoping that Unite will be fully exonerated. Len McCluskey likes to
The Queen of Publishing, Dame Gail Rebuck, abdicated earlier this week when she stood down as chairman and chief executive of Random House. Dame Gail will take up the somewhat more emeritus position of chairman of the UK arm of Penguin Random House — the literary world’s new super-group. Her Majesty will use some of
The wine waiters at Claridges are taking a keen interest in the investigation into malpractice in Falkirk. And they’re hoping that Unite will be fully exonerated. Len McCluskey likes to celebrate political victories at the hotel bar with a glass of pink champagne. His most recent visit was in July 2011 after Rupert Murdoch’s ‘humblest
It’s the peak of the summer party season. Half a dozen events competed for the Westminster crowd last night. The bookies at Ladbrokes made themselves outsiders by holding their booze-up on a boat that cast off a tad too early in the evening. The Adam Smith Institute hosted a bash on the Thames, while a stuffy parliament
Mr Steerpike is still a boy at heart: I feel giddy with anticipation on the first morning of an Ashes series. England versus Australia. 5 Test matches. A golden summer in the offing. There’s nothing like this rivalry in sport, at least to those for whom it matters. And perhaps it matters most to those
Ed Miliband struggled to reach ‘the journalistic community’ at his big speech and press conference today. ‘Where’s Sky, ah there, Mark isn’t it?’, asked Ed. ‘Alistair’ came the reply. Not content with this faux pas, Miliband failed to recognize the BBC’s Nick Robinson and managed to slight Channel Four’s pompous political editor Gary Gibbon. And
Hacked Off are feeling pretty hacked off. John Prescott has resigned as a Privy Councillor, depriving the Queen of his advice. And why? Because the press has come up with its own plans for regulation, and the enemies of press freedom hate it. Mr Steerpike enjoyed last night’s debate between Hacked Off’s Brian Cathcart, a
Mr Steerpike was impressed to see that Ed Miliband took on the ultimate power walk this morning on the way to his Big Speech on trade unions.
The prime minister’s appearance at Wimbledon yesterday, and his invitation of Andy Murray to Downing Street, has got some miserable lefty tongues wagging. No doubt they are livid that the ‘Curse of Cameron’ has lifted, while the memory of Gordon ‘Jonah’ Brown putting the mockers on British sporting endeavour lives. Moaners will always moan that our
Forget the expressions of joy and pain flitting across Kim Sears’ and Judy Murray’s faces as Andy served, volleyed and leapt to win Wimbledon: David Cameron and Alex Salmond’s reactions to the match were far more entertaining. Cameron seems to have spent more of the afternoon looking behind him to check what it was that
The Wimbledon men’s final is now underway and the glamorous (Victoria Beckham, Colleen Rooney) are being joined by the wannabe-glamorous (Miliband, Cameron and Salmond). Mr Steerpike noted Dave – who was gladhanding all and sundry on the way in – was coldshouldered by Salmond. The curry king – who had also been quick to stand
Lib Dem MP Martin Horwood resigns from Unite after taking offence at jokes made by Labour MP Ian Davidson about ‘snivelling liberals’ in the House of Commons. Here is the exchange: Ian Davidson: Well, the Whips have been to see me and they deployed the ultimate threat. They said, “If you think of voting for
Last night, a terrific party was held in Old Queen Street for The Spectator. Our editor Fraser Nelson, looking a little bleary eyed two days after the birth of his third child, still somehow managed to smile at Pippa Middleton, our sports and adventure correspondent. Here is a selection of photos from the bash, courtesy
Lord Bell, AKA the King of Spin, made some noise at the annual Freedom Dinner (established by libertarians to mark the anniversary of the smoking ban) last night at Canary Wharf’s cavernous Boisdale. He had stern words for the anti-tobacco lobby: ‘There is not one shred of scientific evidence of the existence of passive smoking
The Washington Post has had a crack at Mr Steerpike’s favourite game: trashing the Guardian. Full marks to them for a knock out job. The Post describes Britain’s most sanctimonious rag as ‘a newspaper that’s small and underweight even by British standards’. ZAP! Then the Groaner really gets it where it hurts: ‘… the Guardian has its own sacred cows.
Handbags at the ready in the Department for Work and Pensions questions in the House of Commons this afternoon, as Gordon Brown’s former lick-spittle Ian Austin attacked the government benches for never having gone hungry. Something, of course, that the shouty MP for Dudley is somewhat of an expert in. In 2007 he was among
The ‘global race’ has taken the prime minister to Kazakhstan. This peculiar choice of pit-stop has left him open to the charge that his precious time might be better spent than by hobnobbing with Borat. The PM did little to dispel this criticism when he addressed an audience at Nazarbayev University in Askana. Cameron, a PPE graduate, tried
Mr Steerpike is dying to hear Coffee House readers’ captions and comments on what was exciting Ed Miliband so at this recent event.
Margaret Thatcher’s death has reinvigorated her devout following in the Conservative Party. The current Prime Minister was wise to give the House of Lord’s terrace a wide berth last night. It was packed out for the summer party of Conservative Way Forward. This is the pressure group that was established to preserve ‘the lady’s legacy’.
Not for the first time, grumpy actor and Obama fan-boy Alec Baldwin has lashed out at the press and left Twitter in a huff. Baldwin has let rip at the ‘toxic’ showbiz coverage of the Daily Mail, after they accused his pregnant wife, Hilaria, of tweeting during James Gandolfini’s funeral. Baldwin likes to have a