Don't knock Cool Britannia II - it's a clever move by the Tories

It sounds like a cruise liner, doesn’t it? The Cool Britannia II: stopping at Downton Abbey, Game of Thrones and 12 Years a Slave. And if the rumoured guest list is right, the people invited to this reincarnation of Tony Blair’s infamous 1997 luvvie-fest are not far off cruise-liner quality. If Katherine Jenkins isn’t already signed to a P&O, she really should be.

There are some A-listers, though, if the reports are to be believed: Nicole Kidman, Helen Mirren, Ralph Fiennes and Bryn Terfel. But the kind of artists safe enough to make it onto a Number 10 guest list are not the kind of artists anyone is going to be that impressed by. Blair’s coup of getting the once properly edgy Noel Gallagher to the 1997 party was a mistake; Jonathan Powell had invited him without Blair knowing and, when he found out, Blair was terrified of what Gallagher might do.