Ephraim Hardcastle
MARGARET Thatcher’s private secretary Charles Powell delivers a resounding thumbs down to Boris for his handling of the pandemic, saying the Iron Lady would have done better. Powell asks in the Times Literary Supplement: ‘Would a different leader have done better? Margaret Thatcher would undoubtedly have had a better command of the data than Boris Johnson, as well as a more informed overview of the science and tighter control of the detail.’ Could this be Powell’s belated revenge for Boris’s false 1990 claim over a federal Europe which prompted Maggie’s No, No, No speech, Geoffrey Howe’s resignation and her ousting from Downing Street?
THE Duchess of Cambridge continues to snap at the heels of the Duke of Kent’s patronages, becoming joint president of the Scout Association four years after she became Wimbledon patron. She outranks the duke, who remains president. Fingers crossed Kate hasn’t set her sights on Sandringham’s Anmer Club, providing drink, food, bingo and live music. The duke is currently president, though draws the line at bingo calling.
DIARIST Sasha Swire’s dad Sir John Nott will not thank her for revealing his preference for his grandsons over the girls, describing his reaction when chemical terror attacks were feared in the UK in the early 2000s. Nott, once Margaret Thatcher’s Defence Secretary, urgently dispatched ‘mini radiation suits’ to his male grandchildren only. Hugo and Sasha’s two infant daughters were left out.
INSPIRED by Gwyneth Paltrow’s birthday nudity, Amber Rudd’s daughter Flora Gill, pictured, follows suit saying: ‘I’ve spent the last week taking naked pictures of myself – some in underwear, some nude, some with flowers sprouting from my nether regions.’ Her mother once sent a bronze bust of her naked breasts to Flora’s late father, AA Gill. Does it run in the family?
RIGHT-wing pundit Toby Young, 56, mocks Twitterati who have cancelled him a second time in two years after the furore over his appointment by Theresa May to an education board. ‘I’m like Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars,’ he says. ‘They’ve killed me once, they can’t kill me again!’
BONNETS off to actress Una Stubbs who has had one of her paintings, of a lady in a hat, accepted for the summer/winter Royal Academy exhibition, opening on Tuesday. Remarkably, it’s the fourth time in six years Una has had a work chosen even though the selection committee is not told the names of non Royal Academicians submitting paintings. A mere coincidence that Una, who plays the landlady in Sherlock, has been a judge on BBC1’s The Big Picture Challenge.
GLORIA Hunniford fondly remembers her interview with Richard Harris when he told her he required extensive face skin grafts following an accident. After he revealed where the skin had been taken from, Gloria recalls: ‘He said when I kissed his cheek I had actually kissed his a***.’