David davis

Wednesday

James Forsyth

What happened the last time Gove played Cameron’s opponent in debate prep

One of the surprises of the Tory leadership campaign in 2005 was how David Davis bested David Cameron in the TV debate between the two men. Those involved in Cameron’s preparations for that debate blame Cameron’s poor performance on how Michael Gove knocked Cameron’s confidence in the run up to it. Gove was Davis in debate prep and played Davis as a ferociously clever, Oxford Union-style debater and kept leaving Cameron tied in knots. So it is interesting that the Cameron camp have again chosen Gove to play the role of Cameron’s opponent in the run up to a TV debate. This time Gove will, of course, be playing the

Sunday

David Blackburn

Davis for Home Secretary?

The Express’ William Hickey column reports that David Davis, not Chris Grayling, will serve as Home Secretary should the Tories win the election. Here’s what Hickey heard: ‘I’m now told there have been mounting whispers among MPs that Grayling could lose out to David Davis for the Home Secretary’s job should the Tories win the general election. Only this week Davis, who stood down from the shadow post last year in order to champion civil liberties at a by-election, signalled he was ready to return to frontbench politics if offered a “proper job”. A colleague tells me: “David has never really been part of Cameron’s inner circle but many of

Friday

Martin Bright

St George’s Day: A Perfect Celebration of Inferiority

The ersatz English pride expressed by the entirely bogus St George’s Day celebrations is deeply creepy. I hate it. Wandering through London this week and bumping into people wrapped in red and white flags or dressed as knights has made me feel deeply embarrassed to be English. And how can Boris Johnson be so so daft as to embrace this nonsense. He surely can’t mean it. But it did make me wonder about the true scope of the London mayor’s ambitions for himself and Britain-England, coinciding as it did with his admission that has not ruled out a run for Downing Street (presumably after he has beaten David Cameron at