David cameron

David Cameron’s kept his head down, so let him chillax

David Cameron was in the news again this week after being paid £1 million a minute to give a speech explaining why Brexit was a terrible mistake at the annual Gay Stranglers’ Guild gala dinner at a brutal dictatorship in central Asia, before spending a week cruising the Baltic on the yacht of Putin’s second-favourite oligarch with the prettiest members of the Russian men’s lacrosse team. No, wait. My bad. Had he done that, as we know from similar cases, he would have got off scot-free. Instead, the ex-PM did something far, far worse in the eyes of our ever watchful media: he was photographed enjoying himself at a Cotswolds

Life after No. 10 is not what David Cameron was hoping for | 7 August 2017

This article originally appeared in the Spectator in March. It is being reposted on Coffee House after the former Prime Minister was pictured letting his hair down at a festival It can be cruel, the way politics plays out. At the very moment George Osborne was telling the bemused staff of the London Evening Standard last week that his working life in politics had obscured a passionate desire to become a newspaper editor, a familiar figure could be seen in the fresh meat department of the Whole Foods supermarket almost directly underneath the paper’s Kensington newsroom. That man was David Cameron, and inevitably someone with journalistic instincts spotted him, snapped

Steerpike

David Cameron’s festival chillaxing backfires

David Cameron is making the most of life after Downing Street. Having recently been photographed enjoying the high life in the Royal Box at Wimbledon, the chillaxing former Prime Minister has now been seen letting his hair down at another posh venue: Wilderness Festival in Oxfordshire. Glass of wine in one hand and cigarette in the other, Cameron is clearly enjoying himself. But Dave got more than he bargained for on his latest outing. After being asked to pose for a snap with a fellow festival-goer, what he didn’t realise was that the women’s outfit had the Labour leader’s surname – ‘Corbyn’ – emblazoned within a heart on her back.

… and an awesome beak

The Enigma of Kidson is a quintessentially Etonian book: narcissistic, complacent, a bit silly and ultimately beguiling. It is the story of Michael George MacDonald Kidson (MGMK, as he was known), who taught history at Eton from 1965 to 1994 and was an influential tutor to hundreds of boys, often the wayward and the damaged. Jamie Blackett, who was taught by him there, has collected Kidsoniana from former pupils, colleagues, friends and acquaintances. What emerges is a portrait of a colourful maverick who bullied and consoled generations of schoolboys into success and happiness. Blackett conjures up a cheerful world where robust and affectionate Springers (Kidson’s Dougal, Boody, Bertie, Charlie, Jed

The Brexit betrayal bandwagon is growing

It may not be this week. It may not be Boris Johnson. But eventually a minister will break with this tottering government and establish himself (or herself, for it could be Andrea Leadsom) as the leader of the diehard right. Brexit is crying out for its Ludendorff; the scoundrel who can blame his failures on everyone but himself. The smart move for today’s right wing politicians who find their careers blocked is to break with the Tory leadership – whatever or whoever that may consist of – and resort to old  slogans. The referendum delivered a mandate to leave, Johnson, or whoever takes up the challenge of building a new

My beef with David Cameron

Insufficient attention has been paid to the history of naughty girls, who deployed allure to prosper in a male-dominated world. Moralists insisted that they would all come to a bad end. From Jezebel to Cleopatra, Lady Hamilton to Becky Sharp, many did so. But not all. Salomé died a queen; Pamela Harriman, an ambassador. There are also fates which transcend earthly glory. Mary Magdalene is often conflated with the woman taken in adultery. In a wooden sculpture, Donatello depicted her in old age, a pitiless portrayal of the ravages the flesh is heir to. Yet she rises above suffering. The expression on her face is beatific. ‘I know that I

Spotted: John Bercow back in the Royal Box at Wimbledon

Wimbledon wouldn’t be Wimbledon without strawberries and cream, Pimms and…John Bercow in the Royal Box. The speaker of the House of Commons has been something of a permanent fixture over the last few years indulging his love of watching the tennis among the great and the good. Since 2015, he’s managed to get his mitts on £8,000 worth of free tickets to Wimbledon. Today, he’s back in his second favourite seat – watching Jo Konta crash out of the championships while deputy speaker Eleanor Laing filled in for him in the day job in Parliament. Somewhat awkwardly for Bercow though, also in the Royal Box was his old adversary David Cameron. There

The turf | 6 July 2017

Having spent three quarters of my life covering politics and the other quarter following racing, I am often asked what the two have in common. One answer is that politicians are often gamblers. David Cameron tried to solve his party’s divisions over Europe by launching the Brexit referendum and failed spectacularly when an irritated electorate overturned the odds. Despite having a workable majority, Theresa May bet the Tory farm on a snap election seeking to increase it and she, too, lost on an apparent certainty. Playing party political games with the nation’s future, neither deserved any better. Certainly, I find few in racing who believe that Brexit, especially May’s beloved

Why has it been left to David Cameron to make the case for ‘sound finances’?

After days of ministers calling on Theresa May to scrap the public sector pay cap, the fightback has begun. But it’s not coming from the Prime Minister. Instead, it’s been left to May’s predecessor to make the case for fiscal discipline. After the Chancellor put his foot down in a speech to the CBI last night – saying that now is not the time to ‘take our foot off the pedal’, his message was today echoed by David Cameron. On a trip to South Korea, the former Prime Minister appeared to seamlessly step back into his old job as he made the moral case for austerity. He accused those who give

France is finally looking forward to some Brit-bashing

Was that a touch of gloating I detected last night as I watched the news on French television? The lead item was Donald Trump’s acceptance of President Macron’s invitation to attend the Bastille Day commemoration in Paris next month. It’s always a prestigious occasion and this year marks the centenary of America’s entry into WW1. Hence the invitation to the American president which came in a telephone conversation where the pair also agreed on a joint military response against the Syrian regime should Bashar al-Assad launch another chemical attack. That Trump has accepted at relatively short notice – Macron only issued the invite on Tuesday – suggests that The Donald is

Britain is in desperate need of a truly national party

I am not sure I can think of any great public assembly in Britain I’d enjoy less than Glastonbury. Within reason, I’m not sure you could even pay me to go there. Glastonbury is a place for dear Hugo Rifkind not for me, and that’s the way I imagine we both prefer it.  Still, there was something worth seeing at Glastonbury this year. Jeremy Corbyn, obviously. His appearance was remarkable, even if it has also prompted a fresh outbreak of one of Britain’s under-appreciated traditional sports: members of the middle-class sneering at other members of the middle-class.  Even so, two things can be said about this. First, the Labour party

The turf | 22 June 2017

Back on the political beat with CNN for the general election, I was reminded how politics is now dominated by personality, or the lack of it. Led by the media, we want our politicians to be authoritative enough to dominate an EU summit yet ‘normal’ enough to know what’s topping the pop charts or who’s in the final of Strictly Come Dancing. It has led to idiocies such as Gordon Brown pretending he listened to the Arctic Monkeys or an ingratiating David Cameron claiming to have voted for Will Young on X Factor at his daughter’s insistence when Young was actually on Pop Idol, which he won before Cameron’s daughter

Theresa May would be wise to listen to David Cameron

Theresa May has few friends at the moment. But while her Christmas card list might be dwindling, her tally of critics is growing rapidly. Yesterday, John Major urged the Prime Minister to ditch a deal with the DUP or risk jeopardising the peace process in Northern Ireland. Now, David Cameron has waded in, calling for the PM to adopt a ‘softer’ approach to Brexit in the wake of last week’s election disaster. The former PM also said that his successor should change tack and ‘listen to other parties’ on the best way of leaving the EU. So, just another ex-Tory leader with too much time on their hands determined to take up the

Yes, the lowest-paid did best under Cameron

Was the general election a vote against austerity? I was on the Today programme this morning to discuss this point, and in the course of the interview said that the lowest-paid did best under the Cameron years. This raised some degree of incredulity from Twitter, reported by Huffington Post. What planet am I on? I thought I’d answer. The Cameron years were tough, especially for those on welfare. But the aim was always to make people better-off by moving them into work. David Cameron did cut tax for employers, with corporation tax far lower. Liam Byrne, with whom I was on the Today programme, said that companies hoarded cash –

Duchy original

The Cornish nationalist party Mebyon Kernow (‘sons of Cornwall’) is not contesting any seats in the general election. Its leader of 20 years, Dick Cole, said its members were ‘exhausted’ after their local election campaign — it retained four councillors at ‘County Hall’ (Cornish nationalists always put County Hall in inverted commas, to avoid the inference that the Duchy is a mere county), and were only six votes shy of getting as many seats as Labour. It did not have the resources to fight an election so soon after 2015, when all its candidates lost their deposits. You might find it less surprising to learn that Mebyon Kernow is not

Why foreign aid fails – and how to really help Africa | 22 April 2017

The British government is strikingly generous in foreign aid donation But if money alone were the solution we would be along the road not just to ameliorating the lives of poor people today but ending poverty for ever. The idea that large donations can remedy poverty has dominated the theory of economic development — and the thinking in many international aid agencies and governments — since the 1950s. And how have the results been? Not so good, actually. Millions have moved out of abject poverty around the world over the past six decades, but that has had little to do with foreign aid. Rather, it is due to economic growth

The Tory party should not forget George Osborne’s role in its revival

George Osborne’s decision to stand down as an MP is a sign of how impregnable Theresa May’s position is perceived to be. Osborne is the most politically formidable of the Tory sceptics of May’s Brexit plan, and his decision to quit the Commons suggests that he doesn’t think she’ll come unstuck in the next parliament. Of course, Osborne has others things to occupy himself with: the editorship of the Evening Standard and his lucrative work for Black Rock. But one suspects that he’d have been prepared to brazen out the criticism over his multiple jobs if he thought there would be a political sea change in his wing of the

Why do voters find it hard to trust politicians? Because of all the broken promises

‘But you promised!’ Anyone who spends much time with children (whether in an Andrea Leadsom-esque capacity as a mother or otherwise) will recognise that phrase. They’re the words of someone disappointed that the grown ups, who are supposed to be sensible, haven’t followed through. Today Theresa May broke her own promise about there being no early general election. Will helpfully reminds you of five of those promises, repeated by both the Prime Minister and her henchmen, in this post. She had been so adamant that even those who thought they knew her best after years of working together in Opposition and government had taken her at her word and were

Regressive Conservatism

Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour party is coming to resemble a drunk trying to get home on a bike. Most of the time he just pushes it along, but occasionally he mounts the saddle and whirls into action — only to find himself swiftly spread-eagled on the road. Take next month’s local elections. Corbyn launched his party’s campaign trying to bemoan the state of Britain. There are plenty of statistics which he could have trotted out to depict a country underperforming on living standards, debt levels and social mobility. But he chose to cite a supposed decline in life expectancy — which is demonstrably and famously wrong. Life expectancy

David Cameron’s larynx joins the Labour party

Given that Owen Jones, Glenda Jackson and Derek Hatton are just a handful of the figures to recently turn on Jeremy Corbyn, one could be forgiven for thinking that the Labour leader is turning people off Labour. So, Mr S was surprised to learn of Labour’s latest recruit, in today’s issue of the Times. Step forward Clare Foges. Yes, David Cameron’s former SpAd and speechwriter — who earned the affectionate nickname ‘the Prime Minister’s Larynx’ — has joined… the Labour party. Writing in the Times, Foges says that she is as surprised as anyone by her decision: ‘I tapped out the words somewhat guiltily, late at night. This was entering a corner of