Ephraim Hardcastle

OLYMPICS boss Lord Coe has sold the ‘world rights’ to his life story for a six-figure sum. The book will come out in November, yet Seb is supposed to be devoting every moment to preparing a successful Olympiad, for which he is paid £365,507. ‘At last, we can expect to be allowed inside the mind of one of the most successful British athletes of all time,’ enthuses his editor, Roddy Bloomfield, of Hodder – suggesting Coe hasn’t as yet produced his pearls of literary wisdom and experience. Is he keeping his eye on the (Olympics) ball? U.S. TV’S version of Sherlock – set in New York – stars British actor Jonny Lee Miller, 39, as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous detective. His friend and fellow sleuth Watson will be Hollywood beauty Lucy Liu, 43, pictured. Conan Doyle’s work is often subject to unusual interpretations. But a Dr Watson called Lucy? RADIO 4’s Today show presenter James Naughtie has moved from west London back to his native Scotland with wife Eleanor and his beloved bees. ‘I’ve moved the bees, hives and all, to Edinburgh,’ he confides. Will they be repatriated to England if Scotland obtains full independence, a friend inquires teasingly? ‘That is not worthy of a response,’ replies Naughtie huffily. KEN Livingstone swipes at London mayor Boris Johnson’s weekly newspaper column, saying he’ll devote himself ‘fulltime’ to running London if he wins May’s election. But the old fraud wrote for the communist Morning Star while mayor between 2000 and 2008. Aren’t Londoners lucky to have two principled, focused politicians vying to make their lives better? SUPERCOOK Prue Leith says her son, Daniel Kruger, wrote the best speech David Cameron has ever made – his 2007 Tory conference oration. She recalls in a memoir: ‘That evening, Daniel took him a copy of the Evening Standard with the banner headline “Speech Of A Lifetime”. Cameron signed it with the message, “Thank you, Danny”.’ Isn’t it curious Kruger quit politics after that and now runs a charity? ALLEGEDLY punched and head-butted by Labour MP Eric Joyce, Tory MP Stuart Andrew was surprised to find an email from Falkirk’s controversial spokesman in his inbox yesterday. An abject apology? Hardly. Joyce wondered if he had any spare public tickets for PMQS today. What a bounder! A LETTER in the latest Radio Times, from John Sugar of south-west London, says he has recently seen Alastair Campbell on Question Time (BBC1), That Sunday Night Show (ITV1), Loose Women (ITV1) and The Alan Titchmarsh Show (ITV1), as well as on Panorama (BBC1) and Sky Arts 1, recalling his First Love. ‘And this is just TV! I appreciate shows have a finite pool of people to draw on, but wouldn’t it be simpler to just give Alastair Campbell his own channel?