Pick of the week’s Gossip

Victoria Beckham isn’t known for her sunny disposition, but the designer reckons she smiles more now than she used to. “In the past I’ve always looked at those red-carpet pictures of me and seen a woman who looks nervous and insecure,” she told The Sunday Times. “Everyone else saw a woman who looked grumpy and stern – I suppose that’s how I got the reputation of being such a miserable cow.”

Silvio Berlusconi did not relish a hunting trip he once went on with Vladimir Putin, an ally of

the late Italian PM has claimed. According to Fabrizio Cicchitto, a former senator, the incident took place in 2013, at one of Putin’s dachas. Putin proposed the hunting trip, and when he spotted two deer, he urged Berlusconi to take aim at one of them. “That’s yours. Shoot,” Putin said. Berlusconi refused, so the Russian president shot both, gave Berlusconi a “satisfied look” and declared: “Today I will present you with an extraordinary meal.” He then sliced into one of the deer, wrenched out its heart and offered the hunk of bloodied flesh to Berlusconi, who was promptly sick behind a tree.

“Vladimir showed me a violent side that I had not imagined in such a kind and rational man,” Berlusconi reflected afterwards.

Boris Johnson wasn’t the only high-profile figure to forget to bring photo ID to his local polling station last week. Tom Hunt, a Tory MP who’d also backed the ID rule, had to arrange an emergency proxy vote as he was unable to produce his passport. He, however, blamed his dyspraxia. “I do my best but I do lose things,” he said. “I find it shocking how Labour figures locally have sought to exploit this situation.”