Ephraim Hardcastle
WITH former Bake Off star Mary Berry apparently poised for a damehood, what of her Channel 4 successor Prue Leith? Both have CBEs, and Prue’s work for Boris, overhauling unappetising hospital food – something the PM now has unfortunate first-hand knowledge of – surely merits a similar honour. Prue also has a supporter in royal circles. Before marrying William, Kate upgraded her culinary skills with a course at her academy, Leiths School of Food and Wine.
THE next formal event which would have been in exiled Harry’s diary is the opening of the Westminster Abbey Field of Remembrance on November 5. The duty passed to Harry on the retirement of Prince Philip in 2017. Last year, Harry was accompanied by Meghan, with Camilla a no-show due to illness. Who will take Harry’s place? Camilla, whose father Bruce Shand won two Military Crosses in the Second World War, would boost her queen consort ambitions if parachuted in as Harry’s replacement.
JOHN Bercow pops his head up on ITV’s Good Morning Britain to protest against the sacking of Arsenal’s dinosaur mascot, pictured, bellowing: ‘We’ve got to save Gunnersaurus! Arsenal fans must get off their knees... Gunnersaurus is an icon, Gunnersaurus goes nowhere, Gunnersaurus will remain!’ The costume could be downsized for an out-of-work Squeaker, John!
IF Meghan thought she was marrying into a bottomless money pit, a 1961 interview with Wallis Simpson, cautions: ‘Everybody should give up the silly belief that His Royal Highness and I are rich.’ She added: ‘I don’t see why holding a job would be wrong. Suppose the duke sold Cadillacs for a living. Why would that detract from his position?’ If you have to ask...
SIR Nicholas Soames lends an ear to Nick Robinson’s interview with Chancellor Rishi on BBC Radio 4. ‘Highly competent, assured interview,’ he pontificates. ‘With an increasingly absurd Nick Robinson, whose dismal style of interviewing and clever dickery is quite pointless. Rishi made him look a fool.’ Robinson tweets back: ‘Can I put that quote on the cover of my next book, Nick? Or is that me being a clever dick again?’
PRINCESS Margaret’s dalliance with Roddy Llewellyn prompted the late Peregrine Worsthorne to predict in 1976 : ‘There will be royal broken marriages, merry widows, disorderly divorcees and delinquent teenagers.’ Who’d have thought Perry was a bespoke Mystic Meg?
HARRY and Meghan’s biographer Omid Scobie tells Tatler he’s 38 years old despite reportedly informing another interviewer, Andrew Billen, that he was 33. Shouldn’t we enlist the help of the Queen’s racing manager John Warren, an expert at gauging the age of a horse by its teeth?