Jeremy Hunt promises ‘eye-watering’ spending cuts and tax rises in this week’s long-awaited budget, an event he seems to be approaching with, dare I say it, sadistic relish.
But his eagerness to inflict an even greater tax burden on the middle classes may have dramatic consequences for his own political future.
For Hunt has been dealt a poor hand in the proposed parliamentary constituency boundary changes, which were published last week and become law next summer.
Hunt’s South West Surrey constituency is being split into two, making both new seats highly marginal for the Tories. He’s not best pleased at the prospect. ‘I need to understand the implications of the report, which are terrible for me personally,’ he has said.
Jeremy Hunt has been dealt a poor hand in the proposed parliamentary constituency boundary changes, which were published last week and become law next summer
‘After proudly representing Godalming, Farnham & Haslemere (and their surrounding villages) for more than 17 years, it looks like I will have to choose between two halves of a constituency that is basically being cut in two — a frankly impossible and heart-breaking choice. There is now a four-week consultation and I will not be rushing this particularly difficult decision.’
Having represented a constituency which has always returned a Tory MP since it was created in 1983, Hunt knows his Budget is not what the Tory faithful want.
It leaves him facing the possibility of electoral humiliation in 2024 — the first serving post-war Chancellor of the Exchequer to lose his seat at a General Election.
Pioneering female broadcaster Dame Joan Bakewell wasn’t always a model of propriety.
Recalling her early days at the BBC, the woman dubbed ‘the thinking man’s crumpet’ in less enlightened times told Roger Bolton’s Beeb Watch podcast: ‘People could phone in, we sometimes faked that and phoned in our own messages. Various people used to do that, Barry Humphries being one because he could do a multitude of voices, and would pretend to ring up and say: ‘I’m absolutely shocked and disgusted by what’s on BBC television at the moment.’
Humphries was surplus to requirements once clean-up campaigner Mary Whitehouse got into her stride.
- With the Church of England involved in controversy over whether to allow same-sex marriages, there’s an unfortunate slip-up in the Church Times. It has a picture of Bishop of Dudley the Rt Revd Martin Gorick and Bishop of Worcester the Rt Revd Dr John Inge under the headline: ‘Same-sex marriage: Bishops of Worcester and Dudley next to go public.’
When MPs really felt the squeeze
Sir Gavin Williamson prides himself on being the ultimate hardman as a chief whip
His time as a minister in three administrations is nothing to be proud of, but Sir Gavin Williamson prides himself on being the ultimate hardman as a chief whip.
Compared with previous incumbents, however, he was a pussycat. When Labour’s Jack Straw was a new MP, deputy chief whip Walter Harrison approached the future home secretary, grabbed him by the testicles and squeezed tightly. ‘What have I done?’ Straw yelped. ‘Nowt,’ said Harrison with menace, ‘but think what I’d do if you crossed me.’
- Star impersonator Jon Culshaw has refined the art of being Rishi Sunak for Radio 4’s Dead Ringers — and he’s done it by listening to Tony Blair recordings. Sunak is widely regarded as having aped the former PM’s style for years. ‘I mastered Sunak after taking Blair’s precision and staccato, softening it and making it a little more smooth,’ Culshaw reveals.
- Before he set off for the jungle, former health secretary Matt Hancock pledged to donate the profits from his forthcoming Pandemic Diaries to NHS charities. Let’s hope his inside account of battling Covid-19 does more business than his 2011 tome, Masters Of Nothing, about the banking crash. Hancock’s share of the royalties was £409. PS At last someone who has something nice to say about Hancock. Georgia Toffolo, who won the I’m A Celebrity crown in 2017 is rather warming to him. She tweeted: ‘He should have resigned [as an MP] then gone on the show — you can’t do both. HOWEVER . . . he’s coming across SO WELL! Brilliant tele and he’s likeable too.’
