ConservativeHome Diary Week 35: Snogging Jacqui Smith & Other Stories
- 13 Dec 2013
Can anyone explain what our revered Deputy Prime Minister was doing at the Nelson Mandela Memorial Service on Tuesday? No, me neither. I thought his job was, er, to deputise and run the country in the Prime Minister’s absence. He said he had never met Nelson Mandela so quite w...
Liberty Launches Anti-Tory Advertising Campaign
- 10 Dec 2013
This is an advert from the civil liberties group Liberty, headed up by Shami Shakrabarti. It appeared as a full page ad in tonight’s London Evening Standard. It is a disgrace. It’s inaccurate and partial and does Liberty a great disservice. It’s so partisan and inaccurate tha...
ConservativeHome Diary Week 34: Why Can't We See the Chinese For What They Are?
- 6 Dec 2013
Am I alone in feeling queasy at the way David Cameron has been crawling to the Chinese this week in a craven attempt to gain their favour? “We will be the main advocate of China in the West,” he announced on Monday. Pass the sick bag. I completely accept we have to do business...
Attitude Column: The Christmas Dilemma
- 4 Dec 2013
I have been with my partner for 18 years and yet until last year we had never spent a Christmas together. I had always gone to my parents’ in Essex and he to his parents in Kent. In later years he’d make an escape and join me at my parents in the evening, but neither of us fou...
The NHS: Things That Need to be Said...
- 4 Dec 2013
I must be mad. When will I ever learn? I have just accepted an invitation to give a lecture on the NHS to 50 doctors, surgeons and consultants from a London hospital in late January. Why on earth can’t I just learn to say ‘no’? I don’t do a lot of speeches nowadays. My job me...
Would You Like to Help Save the Gay Hussar?
- 30 Nov 2013
The purpose of this blogpost is to invite you to become part of an exciting new venture designed to secure the future of the Gay Hussar restaurant in Soho, a favourite hangout of politicos for decades. I am doing so on behalf of a group of diners and staff, the Goulash Co-ope...
A Question For Lloyds Bank
- 30 Nov 2013
When we bought our house in Norfolk in July we purposely chose a mortgage where we wouldn’t receive penalties if we paid off part of it earlier than planned. So on Tuesday I felt very pleased with myself as I went into Lloyds to pay in a cheque to pay off a small part of the m...
ConservativeHome Diary Week 33: Has Jacqui Smith Looked in the Mirror Lately?
- 29 Nov 2013
I never underestimate the political canniness of Alex Salmond, but his 670 page white paper on Scottish independence was a right old dog’s breakfast. Instead of answering 600 odd questions it provoked yet more of them. I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised but the SNP clearly wa...
My EDP Column Is Dead - It Has Ceased To Be
- 25 Nov 2013
For the last seven years I have been writing a column for the Eastern Daily Press, initially fortnightly but latterly every week. Any freelance columnist knows that at some point all good things come to an end, and for me that point was reached today. This morning I got a cal...
Attitude Column: Can You be Gay and be a Tory?
- 24 Nov 2013
Can you be gay and a Tory? Yes, I know it’s a stupid question, but people continue to ask it. The simple answer is, of course you can, but there are still those who believe that the two things are completely incompatible. For most people being gay is completely separate to th...
ConservativeHome Diary Week 32: What Would Ed Say if It Were a Tory Coke Snorting, Rent-Boy Addicted Religious Banker?
- 22 Nov 2013
I’m sure that like most of you I am left gobsmacked by the antics of former Co-Op bank chairman Paul Flowers – the so-called ‘Crystal Methodist’ preacher. In many ways we should be shocked by his drug-taking, but perhaps we’re not as shocked as we should be. The Sun is terribl...
Attitude Column: Do Gay Men Have a Crap Taste in Music?
- 22 Nov 2013
“Loved your column in Attitude,” wrote my Sky News journalist friend. “Brings some ballast to the magazine.” Er thanks, I thought. I’m not sure he’ll agree once he gets to the end of this one though. “Why is it that gay men have such a shit taste in music?” queried another fr...
ConservativeHome Diary Week 31: What the PM Should Do in Sri Lanka
- 15 Nov 2013
The Times (£) trumpets that Croydon South has rejected three of David Cameron’s favoured candidates (they all work for him in Number Ten) during their selection contest. It is apparently a “snub” to the Prime Minister. Bollocks. What is far more likely is that the three of the...
Bloody Well Done to Jeremy Hunt!
- 8 Nov 2013
Steve Wright used to have a character on his Radio 1 afternoon show called Mr Angry. Each time he rang into the programme he would end his call with the words “I’m so angry, I could throw the phone down!” And that’s what he then did. I feel like that right now. Why? Because J...
ConservativeHome Diary Week 30: Whatever Happened to 'Recall'?
- 8 Nov 2013
It was in the Liberal Democrat manifesto. It was in the Tory manifesto. It was in the Coalition Agreement. So why has nothing been done about it? What am I talking about? Yes, the power of recall. After the expenses scandal, David Cameron and Nick Clegg made great play of the ...
Book Review: Piers Morgan's Diaries: Shooting Straight
- 6 Nov 2013
I’ve never quite understood why so many people appear to hate Piers Morgan. I like him. I find him funny, witty, entertaining and, yes, often thoroughly irritating. People write about him as if he is somehow thick and has got to where he has purely by luck and good fortune. It...
Book Review: A Blaze of Autumn Sunshine - Tony Benn's Last Diaries
- 5 Nov 2013
Last Thursday I went to see Tony Benn to interview him for the LBC Book Club. Because I hadn’t reached the end of his book, I hadn’t realised he had moved out of his family home on Holland Park Avenue and had moved into sheltered accommodation round the corner. The interview w...
The Tonbridge Open Primary Showed the Tories At Their Best
- 3 Nov 2013
Yesterday morning I became poacher turned gamekeeper, or was it the other way around? Back in 2009 I was a candidate in the Bracknell Open Primary. There were seven candidates in the final. I came third, behind Rory Stewart, and the eventual winner, local GP Philip Lee. Yester...
ConservativeHome Diary Week 29: For Once, Ed Balls Was Right
- 1 Nov 2013
Tomorrow morning, I’m moderating Tonbridge & Malling’s Open Primary, where local people will select a candidate to follow Sir John Stanley. My last experience of an open primary was competing in one in Bracknell in 2009, and a few weeks before that chairing the Bedford May...