Tag: Conservative

Distraction Dom

Matthew Steeples suggests devious Dominic Cummings might actually be the best asset bungling Boris Johnson has got left; the king of distraction has made Jennifer Arcuri go away

Aside from consoling himself with the weak warblings of morose ministers who’ve been drafted out to lackadaisically laud him, most would suggest Dominic Cummings is the loneliest man in politics this Sunday. Instead, in reality – though no one’s got around to publicly saying it (yet) – this modern day Mandelson could still prove to be Boris Johnson’s most useful asset.

Hidden away somewhere deep in Downing Street in his beanie hat, this lookalike of Compo from Last of the Summer Wine crossed with Michael Kelly as Doug Stamper in the House of Cards has achieved one very important thing this weekend: Cummings has made the tawdriest elements of the Jennifer Arcuri story disappear from Sunday’s front pages.

Whilst Cummings’ wife, Mary Wakefield, certainly didn’t help the initial narrative with her clearly confused and contradictory account of how the pair had lived during their time with coronavirus in The Spectator, she certainly set in place curiosity as to where and in the company of whom the PM’s closest henchman had been sleeping. Then, when this Oxford graduate went “off on one” with his arrogant utterings as he clambered into his Land Rover Discovery yesterday, Cummings actually pulled a blinder.

Subsequent revelations as to whether the senior adviser to the Prime Minister attempted a rendition of Theresa May’s “wandering in the wheat fields” and boogied in the bluebells are surprisingly neither here nor there. Aside from quite rightly exciting anger from the public due to his hypocrisy, Cummings, in true Machiavellian fashion, has instead just shifted the news agenda away from BoJo’s very own bedroom behaviour.

In a clear example of the ‘distraction technique’ coming into play, Cummings’ travails have made everyone forget the sordid sexual relations ‘Bonking Boris’ had with the American founder of Hacker House. According to a most reliable source close to Downing Sttreet, Arcuri – a woman whom believes she has “been thrown under a bus” by her former lover – was about to give a “kiss-and-tell,” but has now retreated to her bunker. For now, ‘Bungling Boris’ can stay home and stay safe; the blabbering bird has (for now) been belted-up.

Pictured top: The finest examples of modern day distraction technique spinners in politics (both in reality and in fiction) have to be Dominic Cummings and Doug Stamper.

(Not So) Sexy Time with Jen and Dom – Jennifer Arcuri’s alleged attempt to kiss-and-tell about her indoor activities with Boris Johnson were supposedly put on hold this weekend due to the outdoor antics of Dominic Cummings dominating the news.

Elsewhere on social media and taking a break from sharing his enjoyment of Vimto and dislike of Jeremy Clarkson, the “laureate for our fractured times” turned Pan Macmillan published novelist Brian Bilston shared a poem he’d prepared about Mr Cummings. It follows.

Dominic Cummings: The Lockdown Tour

By Brian Bilston

He’s been locking down in London,

And a bit in Durham, too.

Not to mention Barnard Castle,

Legoland and Bristol Zoo.

He’s been locking down in Stoke-on-Trent

And Weston-super-Mare.

He’s spread himself quite thin of late.

He’s been spreading everywhere.

He’s been locking down in Basildon,

In Derby, Penge and Frome.

Wherever he lays his beanie hat,

That’s his lockdown home.

He’s more spreadable than margarine.

He’s been spreading far and wide.

He’ll be locking down in your town soon:

Spread the word and stay inside.

To support a Change.org petition calling for Dominic Cummings to either “resign or be sacked,” click here.

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Tweedle Deviant and Tweedle Deviant – Is Dominic Cummings and Boris Johnson’s brotherhood of bumbling balls-ups about to be brought to an end? The public are most definitely braying for blood.

May 24, 2020
A Box Office Balls-up

Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea council’s decision to approve replacement for Kensington Odeon with a 63% smaller cinema is deservedly condemned as a “box office balls-up”

The much-loved Odeon Kensington cinema closed its box office on the 11^th September 2015 in spite of a campaign to save it backed by amongst others Richard Curtis, John Hurt and Prince Michael of Kent.

Bar its original neo-classical façade, built in 1926, the unlisted building was subsequently demolished and with its destruction went a cinema premises that originally had a seating capacity of 2,370 in stalls and circle levels according to the Cinema Treasures website.

Now, five years later, after round after round of battle between developers keen to construct housing there and activists keen to reinstate the cinema, the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea planning committee have finally approved a new set of revised plans for the site.

The new approved £400 million scheme (replacing a previous consent granted in 2016) gives Lodha Properties permission to build a six-screen cinema with just 887 seats as well as 67,000 square foot of commercial space. In addition, the scheme will include 71 private residences and 35 ‘affordable’ homes whilst the developer is also expected to contribute £1.4 million towards affordable homes off-site.

Whilst the new Tory MP for Kensington Felicity Buchan predictably took to Twitter to claim this Conservative led council decision “very good news for Kensington High Street,” others were less pleased with the outcome. Referencing the decision as “undermining the character of our community,” the crusading From The Hornets Nest blog condemned the development as adding “yet more empty luxury flats to an already overcrowded Kensington market place.”

Illustrative of the council’s “unhealthy developer alliances and disastrous decisions” according to one commentator, the new scheme unsurprisingly contains fewer social housing units and a cinema reduced in size by 1,483 seats. This, indeed, is not a community success but what another termed “a tragedy.”

Of the decision Matthew Steeples, editor-in-chief of The Steeple Times added: “Here, yet again, is illustration of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea council putting profit before people and cash before culture. The cinema component of this scheme is purely a token sop to attempt to attempt to silence critics of this out-of-touch council’s latest box office balls-up.”

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A box office balls-up by The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea council – ‘From The Hornets Nest’ also highlighted that certain RBKC councillors including Daniel Moylan had accepted hospitality from those associated with previous developers involved in the Kensington Odeon redevelopment scheme. Such behaviour made Councillor Robert Davis of Westminster’s antics – highlighted in ‘The Steeple Times’ in February 2018 – look amateurish and frankly it is time for the final curtain call on such behaviour.

May 23, 2020
Wally of the Week – Nadine Dorries

Tory twerp and Twitter twaddler ‘Mad Nad’ Nadine Dorries MP deserves to be sacked (if she doesn’t first resign) after disgracefully smearing Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer

It’s an incredibly rare thing when the Trotskyist terror Owen Jones is the one talking complete sense, but in calling for Nadine Dorries – a woman whom once ludicrously remarked: “[I’m] not an MP for any other reason other than because God wants me to be” – to be sacked after defaming Sir Keir Starmer by retweeting far-right smears about him, the author of Chavs is for once bang on the nail.

Quick to demand others correct, their errors – in August 2019, for example, Dorries herself tweeted: “I hope all those who gleefully flew to the keyboard and typed out #porkies in an attempt to traduce the reputation of our PM @BorisJohnson are as quick to bang out an apology and put the record straight” – Dorries, currently a health minister for patient safety, suicide prevention and mental health, used Twitter to share a doctored far right video. It had been falsely manipulated to make it look like the new Labour leader knew about child abuse and did nothing whilst head of the Crown Prosecution Service and though she’s deleted it, she hasn’t even issued a public apology.

The woman whom branded David Cameron and George Osborne “two arrogant posh boys who don’t know the price of milk” has now been shown herself to be someone who doesn’t know the truth behind what she tweets. In December 2012, Dorries declared: “My career is not over… It’s only just beginning.” We’d now argue, it’s time for this berk to end it all; it’s time for ‘Mad Nad’ to bog off and write a few more bonkbusters.

#ResignDorries

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Shame on ‘Mad Nad’ – Owen Jones called for Nadine Dorries to be sacked on Friday on Twitter (left); the since deleted retweet in which the Member of Parliament for Mid Bedfordshire suggested a “fake news” tweet was “revealing.”

Nadine Dorries where she belongs – The self-publicising MP covered in cockroaches and maggots whilst participating in I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! in November 2012.

May 15, 2020
Plastered Meyer

Swivel-eyed berk Sir Christopher Meyer appears on Sky News in a plastered condition; his “Chanel-clad” pointy-fingered wife was, however, nowhere to be seen

Concealing a bit of a bash on Tuesday evening, tittle-tattling former ambassador Sir Christopher Meyer appeared on Sky News to share some totally irrelevant drivel that nobody needed to know about the relationship between America and China. Anybody sensible went to the kitchen and poured themselves a glass of wine during the tedious segment and only returned when the obnoxious oaf had been replaced onscreen.

As ever, drippy dimwit Sir Christopher, husband to the late-not-so-great PM Theresa May’s bestie, sniveling snob Baroness “Chanel-Clad” (AKA ‘Charity-Tin Cathy’), proved himself as much use as a chocolate teapot. His most pertinent remark was to claim: “Trump is desperate to shift the blame for the coronavirus onto the Chinese… Why? Because this is an election year.” A revelation and a half, if ever there were one.

Subsequently, looking and sounding a tad beyond over-oiled, this weird wazzock continued: “Remember injections of disinfectant and all that?” Perhaps, indeed, his not-so-good lady wife had administered him with just such prior to plonking the plaster-clad prat in front of Sky News’ camera.

Now, Sir Christopher: Please, just get back on your meds old chap. Thank you kindly.

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Elsewhere, on Twitter, a “South American banker” named David Hutchinson shared his views about deservedly loathed “red-socked fop” also. He most accurately commented: “Sir Christopher Meyer. Anti-EU. A cerebral skinhead without the tattoos.”

May 5, 2020
Moron of the Moment – Lady Brady

‘The Steeple Times’ suggests that in the wake of the latest drivel she spouted in ‘The Sun on Sunday’ well-known washed-up wench and all-round “nasty piece of work” Karren Brady belongs in the funny farm

In her weekly column in The Sun on Sunday yesterday, The Right Honourable The Baroness Brady of Knightsbridge CBE – better known simply as Karren Brady, an “overpainted Aunt Sally caked in cheap makeup” whose businesses associations have primarily involved the grubby pornographer David Sullivan and the “cross between Shylock and Al Capone” that is Sir ‘Shifty’ Philip Green – shared a bit of information that nobody need ever know.

Aside from illustrating her rank on the Mensa roster in revealing something nobody else on the entire planet knew in stating: “What a month it’s been for Boris Johnson,” Lady Brady also announced: “I am as keen as the next person to regain my freedom.” She then, pass the sick bucket urgently please, added: “At present, in fact, I am mainly wearing pyjamas all day as well as in bed.” As constellation, at a time when we are all coping with the COVID-19 lockdown, one can at least be thankful that she didn’t go further and follow Baroness Mone and go on about her bra choices or dip into the territory of Ferne McCann and try and flog some soiled knickers.

Disgracefully ennobled by David Cameron for utterly no good reason, “muckspreader” Lady Brady (AKA ‘Baroness Bozo’ and #LazyBrady) went on to show how out of touch she is with the ordinary populous. In a segment ever-so enthusiastically titled: “PREGNANT PAUSE FOR A NATION” (in caps for extra-special emphasis), this dimwitted oddity bizarrely offered “huge congratulations” to an American model of Dutch-Palestinian descent named Gigi Hadid and an English singer of Pakistani-Irish descent named Zayn Malik. We’re no doubt lightyears away from fathoming the reasoning as to why the ever-so-vital “pregnant pause” and the ever-so “huge congratulations” are especially required for Hadid and Malik, but, hey ho, we are dealing with Karren Brady – Lord Sugar’s token bit of sideline smut from the graveyard for self-declared “genuine celebrities” that is The Apprentice.

Aside from not explaining exactly which “nation” exactly she was referencing (she probably doesn’t actually know what a nation is herself, poor love), former “dildo merchant” turned “faithful companion of Jesus” Lady Brady helpfully then declared: “They are expecting a baby… which just proves that life goes on. What a beautiful baby they will have. It’s great to have some good news amid the gloom.” Let’s all join her and praise the Lord.

Of this wannabe prophet, one reader previously observed: “All business transactions associated with Lady Brady end in Richard Branson-esque failure” and now we’ll go further: “All falling for the supposed wise words of the pyjama-clad Lady Brady henceforth may find themselves joining her in the funny farm.” It is now time to lock this hapless harridan in a padded cell and throw away the key.

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May 3, 2020
The Blatancy of Branson

As Sir Richard Branson demands a combined £1.2 billion in bailouts from the Australian and British governments during the coronavirus pandemic, we call for him to be stripped of his knighthood

Sir Richard Branson can’t have it both ways: He’s either British or he’s a tax exile based in the British Virgin Islands. But, no, in the typically brazen style of this baloney filled billionaire, ‘Dickhead’ has to have it all. And then, just to top it off, he has to have a bit more… And then to cap it, a little bit more, just to be absolutely sure.

Like the fat cat that got the cream, the fat cat always comes back wanting extra. Now, with news that not only is the job killing, non-payer of any personal income tax for 14 years in the UK is demanding not only £500 million ($625 million, €572 million or درهم2.3 billion) as a bailout from the British government to “help” Virgin Atlantic, but also £700 million ($875 million, €800 million or درهم3.2 billion) from the Australian government to bailout Virgin Australia as well, this greedy pig has finally taken the biscuit.

BVI resident Branson’s record isn’t exactly something worth celebrating. Whilst the 312^th richest person in the world, the anything but patriotic Branson – whom the Guardian rightly mocked this morning for “often draping himself in the Union flag” – has deservedly come under attack from both the left and right in Westminster. Angela Rayner of the Labour Party tweeted: “Richard flog your private island and pay your staff, we are in unprecedented times here. Now is the time your staff need support after making mountains of cash for the company” whilst Conservative MP Richard Fuller added: “Pay your employees yourself their unpaid leave. When it comes to looking at the protection of your workers, the time is now, and we will all judge you by your actions.”

Whilst we reported on how the motormouth Katie Hopkins had a pop at the Branson last week, this fantasist “wedding wrecker” and convicted tax evader must accept that where there are payouts there are also responsibilities. In September 2019, the cretinous self-appointed “entrepreneur” received £178 million ($219 million, €200 million or درهم804 million) when he cashed in on his pilot killing Virgin Galactic floating on the New York Stock Exchange; perhaps, now, he could use some of this cash to prop up his own failing enterprises. The likelihood of that? Well, we’ll have to spot Shergar the racehorse speeding by carrying Elvis Presley first. Now, instead, is the time that Britain took something back from Branson: Strip this pathetic parasite of his precious knighthood.

Pictured top: “Second rate creep” Sir ‘Dickhead’ Branson likes to get hold of whatever he can; here he is ‘Now Boarding’ whilst greedily grabbing a bikini-clad bird.

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April 13, 2020
Dumb Daniel

Matthew Steeples calls out Daniel Hannan for ludicrously not wanting to encourage British people to consume locally produced food

Daniel Hannan claims to support localism. He wants to end Value Added Tax and replace it with a local sales tax, set by local councils. The ex-MEP is also obsessed with national sovereignty and whilst often bizarrely banging on about trading with Ethiopia also, today basically said he wishes to discourage British farmers to produce more on their own land.

Arch-Brexiteer Daniel Hannan has been mocked recently for his ludicrous analysis of how coronavirus will change our lives. In a column for ‘The Telegraph’ he bizarrely announced: “If coronavirus has one silver lining it should be the return of the bow and curtsy”. He elaborated: “A handshake can be an awkward thing – a clumsy, clammy grapple. But a woman breathes something of herself into her curtsy. She can make the gesture demure or haughty, coy or brazen… She can swish her skirts alluringly or bob coldly. The same is true, mutatis mutandis, for men. A bow allows you to convey precisely the degree of respect or affection you consider appropriate.”

Yesterday, at a local pub, I was able to fill this empty 750ml gin bottle with locally produced beer for just £2. Daniel Hannan: “What’s wrong with that?”

In an article for The Telegraph, this fan of Enoch Powell claimed “COVID-19 is pushing us to protectionism” and added that: “The idea that growing your own food makes you more secure sounds plausible, but turns out to be nonsense… If you think about it, national food self-sufficiency makes no more sense than village food self-sufficiency.”

Whilst rightly Hannan admits “we have one of the most innovative agri-food sectors on the planet,” wrongly he doesn’t want to encourage it. Here, in my self-imposed isolation in East Anglia, I’ve seen exactly to the contrary. Walking in the local countryside, I pass farms with roadside stalls. They sell locally produced eggs, locally produced fruit and veg and even offer locally grown flowers as well. The village pub – turned into a community shop due to it being unable to sell booze in its normal manner – now sells locally produced pies and locally made ale even (at a most reasonable just £2 to fill a bring-your-own bottle) to takeaway and frankly, it’s all for the good. People are eating more healthily here now and surprisingly these goods are being sold at a lower cost than they’re retailed for by the greedy middlemen – AKA the supermarkets – in normal times.

Growing local is good for the local economy and buying local is even better. Supporting your local food and drink producers is a jolly good thing and Daniel Hannan is dumb to say otherwise.

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April 5, 2020
Support Stewart

Matthew Steeples backs Rory Stewart as the best candidate to become the next Mayor of London

Having very briefly met the ‘sofa surfing’ Rory Stewart in Pavilion Road yesterday, I must say I found him affable and open. We briefly discussed Shaun Bailey’s ludicrous policy of handing out burglar alarms to 300,000 households and today I urge London based readers to join me in backing his campaign to become the next Mayor of London.

South Kensington based Stewart, unlike his dimwitted Conservative counterpart and the frankly inept banger-on about being a son of a bus driver Sadiq Khan, is a man of action. Born in Hong Kong and educated at Eton and Oxford, here is someone who crosses divides and has been a member of both the Labour and Conservative parties. He has worked at the Foreign Office, been in command in battlezones, tutored Prince William and Harry and been lauded for his written and presentational work also. Here indeed is someone versatile and capable and quite frankly, at this time, this is just what London needs.

Stewart’s is clear about what he’d do: He would triple the number of police on the streets and he’d make housing more affordable by using public land for public benefit. These policies make sense and now is the time to help him get elected.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXBy4PS7Nyw&feature=emb_logo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=0Nqy2LekGq0&feature=emb_logo

March 2, 2020
Wally of the Week – Shaun Bailey

Mayor of London candidate Shaun Bailey’s policy of giving out burglar alarm to 300,000 homes is utterly ludicrous

Burglar and car alarms are certainly amongst the most pointless inventions in history. Generally ignored, they annoy those in their vicinity and never seem to work when they’re actually required.

Now, first reported in the blog From The Hornets Nest, “man of gimmicks” Shaun Bailey – the Conservative candidate for Mayor of London – has decided to “give” burglar alarms to every Londoner aged over 65.

In a video shared on Twitter, Bailey announced his policy but did not cite any evidence as to why it would actually be effective. He remarked:

“What I am suggesting I will do is to give free burglar alarms to people aged over 65. They are the most vulnerable people in our communities and they need this protection and there’s the other end of this conversation as well. It makes burglary harder and what that does is reduce the amount of people who become career burglars.”

Patronisingly, this foolish man with pockets plainly as large as China then added:

“Of course if you really have one or you feel that you can buy your own one, please do go ahead. But you are talking about 200,000 to 300,000 Londoners who really need that support.”

As From The Hornets Nest rightly points out, “the millions he proposes to spend [would be] better deployed on replacing ‘on the streets’ police removed whilst he was ‘advising’ [David] Cameron on crime.”

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March 1, 2020
Where’s Theresa (When You Actually Need Her)?

“Fed up” Maidenhead constituent who fears “one foot wrong and you could be over” gets no help from Theresa May over a missing lamp post

When she’s not naughtily wandering through wheat fields or rambling around with her garden gnome-like money magnet husband Philip, our former Prime Minister Theresa May should surely be helping her constituents in the Royal Borough of Maidenhead.

Sadly, it seems, this is not the case as, according to the Maidenhead Advertiser, the former Tory leader has not done anything to help residents of the town’s Marlborough Road after a delivery driver knocked down one of their lamp posts.

Madelene Lachello of Marlborough Road, Maidenhead is a very angry woman due to the fact a lamp post is missing from her street. What is her local Member of Parliament Theresa May doing about this? Plainly absolutely nothing.

Speaking to the paper, resident Madelene Lachello angrily announced: “The darkness is an issue. You can’t physically see outside, it is so pitch black, and there are a lot of single ladies living down this road as well.”

The irate busybody continued: “I’m so fed up phoning the [Royal] Borough and not getting anywhere. They just say: ‘We’ve passed it on and we’ll give you a call to let you know what’s going on’ – but you hear nothing.”

Lachello furiously concluded: “There’s no lighting, people could be walking up there and if you put one foot wrong you could be over.” Death by missing lamp post plainly beckons.

Perhaps the worst Prime Minister in history could finally find herself something useful to do: Perhaps it’s time for this hapless harridan to personally go and turn the lights back on in Marlborough Road, Maidenhead.

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February 5, 2020