Ephraim Hardcastle
SMARMY ex-Tory MP Michael Portillo’s gig on BBC One’s This Week – buttock to buttock with ample Labour MP Diane Abbott – could soon be over. A BBC source says: ‘He’s become boring. Also, he called the election wrongly, saying Labour would win.’ Who might take his place? The show’s producers fancy ex-Labour shadow chancellor Ed Balls, who has lost his seat. We’ll see!
THE Duchess of Cornwall’s struggle to egress the Irish State Coach, which I mentioned yesterday, was noticeable. But did you clock the red-and-gold-attired footmen? They’re no longer Royal Mews staff but officers from the Met Police’s Royalty Protection Branch (SO14) ‘with firearms under their state tunics’, says a source, adding: ‘Household staff look straight ahead. Police “footmen” scan the crowds.’
WHAT must the BBC’s erstwhile sports editor, David Bond, be thinking about the Fifa corruption uproar? In 2011, he broadcast a ‘world exclusive’ Panorama Special saying Fifa official Phaedra Almajid had withdrawn allegations of corruption. Curiously, two men she accused are now sought for questioning by the FBI. Bond has left the BBC and now works with Milltown Partners, the PR firm run by Paddy Harverson, who once advised the Prince of Wales.
NOVELIST Victoria Hislop’s first book – The Island, based on Crete and published in 2006 – has sold an astounding 2million copies, 500,000 of them in France. She owns a home on Crete and says, in an interview: ‘When I am taken for a Greek woman, I am flattered.’ Ms Hislop, 55, pictured, is the wife of impish Private Eye editor and Have I Got News For You TV panellist Ian Hislop, 54. They also have homes in Sissinghurst, Kent, and Chelsea, London. Isn’t it time they were ‘recognised’ honour-wise?
COVERAGE of the general election cloaked another contest: (chief presenter) David Dimbleby versus his aspiring BBC successor, Huw Edwards. ‘There was concern – after the shock Tory win – that Dimbleby would remain broadcasting after 7am on Friday, when anxious Edwards was due to take over,’ says my source. ‘(Director general) Tony Hall and head of news James Harding were there in case there was a problem.’ Fancy!
FORMER head of Nato Lord Carrington, 95, thinks the organisation was ‘crazy’ to suggest Ukraine for membership because ‘it’s part of the Russian sphere’. It was also wrong to make an enemy of Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, he tells The Oldie. ‘They should have hugged and stroked Putin and put in a real effort on him.’ He’s right, isn’t he?
SHADOW Leader of the House Angela Eagle marks the appointment of Leader of the House Chris Grayling in characteristically barbed fashion, telling MPs: ‘Given an eagle is a predator, I thought I would find out what a “grayling” is. The dictionary defines it as a small grey fish, frequently used as bait.’ Look out!