Boris Johnson is good at promising to save Christmas why doesn’t he save the Criminal Justice System? If our pay review is derisory we should go on strike
- 28 Nov 2021
Yesterday I attended the Criminal Bar Association winter conference. It was joyous and uplifting to see so many old friends. But ‘old’ was the the name of the game. There were very few young barristers there. Why? Because appalling working conditions, low pay, stress, the wor...
Johnson has trashed his party, Parliament & his backbenchers he must be swiftly evicted from Number 10
- 12 Nov 2021
I suspect that this is the last time the Grand old Duke of Pork will lead his troops to the top of the hill and march them down again. He has trashed the Conservative brand, trashed Parliament and trashed the reputations of hardworking, honest members of Parliament; which is m...
The most deliciously political budget I have ever seen. And Johnson will start a dirty war against his chancellor
- 27 Oct 2021
Thank heavens that most of the government front bench were wearing face coverings during the budget speech today. Apart from their green eyes it concealed their envy at the most outrageous bid for the leadership that I have ever seen. And I got the distinct impression that s...
Carrie on Shuffling
- 16 Sep 2021
Reshuffles are rather strange affairs. They are a little like relying on your sat nav without previously consulting a map as sometime you end up where you don’t want to be. This latest effort is more a tribute act to the goings on at Madame Cynthia Payne’s Ambleside Av...
Has the ‘invincible’ Boris finally gone bonkers?
- 11 Sep 2021
Hardly a day goes by without an old chum turning to me sadly and saying that he is no longer a member of the Conservative Party because of the the crass awfulness of Johnson and his incompetent cabinet. They tend to be split into two groups. Those on the right who think the g...
When Boris finally kicks open the swing doors of the Last Chance Saloon the Tories might decide that they have had enough of the Cowboy & that it’s time for the Indian
- 11 Aug 2021
It is now time for my annual lecture on the pointless irrelevance of the silly season sport of predicting who will be promoted and who will be parliamentary roadkill in the ‘forthcoming’ reshuffle. Dear readers they are total bollocks dreamt up in pubs and bars by journalists ...
Vaccines passports are for the market not the government
- 31 Jul 2021
MPs always get fractious before the summer break. But none so bitter as the various skirmishes within the Conservative party. A few weeks ago Starmer looked as if he was on the ropes. But now the message that was beginning to sound like an overplayed broken record, namely that...
At the moment it’s all a matter of tryst. But for how long?
- 26 Jun 2021
I am beginning to feel rather sorry for Matt Hancock. He has been vilified, humiliated, called ‘fucking useless’, by Johnson and a serial liar by Cummings. And now he has been caught in a clinch with an aide. But, if in the unlikely event of him resigning, it will be because ...
The paranoid chaos of Number 10 is briefing against a new enemy; Rishi Sunak
- 31 May 2021
In the weird, paranoid, toxic chaos that passes for a government another villain is emerging from the burning rubble of Number 10; Rishi Sunak. It’s crazy. But it is entirely predictable in Boris Johnson’s white knuckled ride on a political rollercoaster whose tracks are still...
Johnson must seize the moment and have his Night of the Long Knives
- 9 May 2021
I do not begrudge Boris Johnson his moment in the sun. Those election results were remarkable for a whole range of reasons. In an alchemy way beyond my comprehension, this old Etonian with as much emotional intelligence as a tub of cold pot noodle who thinks that monogamy is s...