‘Puritan-in-chief’ to enter the jungle

I haven’t watched I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Here! for years.

When Antony Worrall Thompson, Forest’s patron, appeared in the third series in 2004 I watched it in a partly professional capacity to see how he got on.

Thereafter I made a mental note of how the smokers fared compared to the non-smokers.

In terms of their popularity with the public or their fellow contestants it seemed to make no difference whether contestants smoked or not.

What mattered, surprise, surprise, was whether they were nice, thoughtful and considerate people.

Antony came fifth in 2004 after leading a mutiny in which he demanded more cigarettes when the camp ran out of supplies.

Since then kings of the jungle have included Phil Tufnell and Shaun Ryder who were often seen smoking on screen.

There were other smokers whose names escape me but as a social experiment I found it quite interesting because it was clear that for most people - either voting at home or exposed in camp to someone smoking around them - the habit was not a significant issue, contrary to what we are led to believe by anti-smoking campaigners.

More recently however smoking has been edited out of I’m A Celebrity, effectively censored, with smokers told to light up in smoking areas off camera.

That said, I’m not sure how many smokers have even been signed up to appear on recent series. It may not be a deal breaker but I suspect the number of contestants who smoke is close to zero these days.

Which brings me to Matt Hancock.

Personally I’m delighted the former health secretary is appearing on this year’s programme and I shall definitely watch.

Of course he should be at work, not gallivanting about on the other side of the world earning a large fee for doing relatively little, but can anyone really blame him?

I just wish there were a handful of smokers in camp to test the puritan-in-chief’s tolerance but looking at the 2022 cast (half of whom I’ve never heard of) I think he’s safe.

Of the ten other confirmed contestants only former Radio One DJ Chris Moyles is a known smoker (as of 2020) while ex-smoker Boy George is reported to have said that ditching the fags was ‘the best thing he ever did’.

If George confides in him that should be music to Matt’s ears. But will they agree on anything else?

See: Health Secretary Matt Hancock is set to call for smoking to be wiped out in England completely by 2030, a leaked government plan has revealed (Politics Home, July 2019)

See also: Vernon Kay reveals I’m A Celeb's secret smoking room before trials (Radio X)

Lobbying and lunch

James Heale, Spectator diary editor and co-author of the new Liz Truss biography (see previous post), tweets:

Longtime lobbyist and bon viveur Lionel Zetter - the former proprietor of the legendary Shepherd's restaurant - is now back in Westminster as a part-time political adviser to the Department of Health.

Interesting. Zetter wrote what is arguably the definitive book on lobbying (Lobbying: The Art of Political Persuasion) and I believe he is one of the best connected people in Westminster.

I can’t remember how or when our paths first crossed but he’s someone I would recognise and say hello to if we passed one another in the street.

Surprisingly perhaps Lionel was involved in the reopening in 2014 of Shepherd’s restaurant in Marsham Street, a short walk from the Palace of Westminster. (See Tory lobbyist Lionel Zetter ‘shepherds’ comeback of Westminster institution.)

When I think about it however lobbying and lunch make the perfect partners, or they used to.

In its heyday Shepherd’s of Westminster (which was once owned by restaurateur Peter Langan and Michael Caine) had been one of the go to restaurants for politicians, journalists and lobbyists.

This was partly because of its proximity to Parliament but Shepherds was also traditional, British and discreet (allegedly) although how true that was I don’t know.

I remember on one occasion having lunch with an MP who insisted on moving to another table so we were further away from other diners which made me question why he suggested going there in the first place.

The only way to guarantee privacy was to book one of two small private dining rooms, which is what I did on a couple of occasions when having lunch with small groups of journalists and MPs.

Shepherd’s was also quite formal (if I remember you were expected to wear a tie) and this perhaps accelerated its decline at a time when long boozy lunches were also falling out of favour.

The restaurant closed in 2013 but reopened under new management in late 2014. According to one report:

Lionel Zetter, veteran lobbyist, public affairs expert and now director of the revamped restaurant, said of the opening: “Westminster is short of really good restaurants. Choice-wise, there is nothing that does really good ‘British’ food. I want to resurrect Shepherd’s and take it back to its best: superb food, great service, an elegant ambience and a discreet environment.”

Sadly Shepherds closed again in August 2019 and I can’t say I was surprised. I went to the reopened restaurant a couple of times and on both occasions it was virtually empty, perfect for plotting and indiscreet gossip but devoid of atmosphere which was a shame because I was willing it to succeed.

Anyway I’m curious to know more about Lionel’s role as a political adviser at the Department of Health. Perhaps he’d like to have lunch?!

See also: Order, order: MPs’ favourite restaurants (Spectator)

Truss biography gets new title and earlier publication date

Pleased to see that the authors of the forthcoming Liz Truss biography have settled on a new title.

Two weeks ago I noted that despite her woes Out of the Blue: The inside story of Liz Truss and her astonishing rise to power was still scheduled to be published on December 8 with its original title.

Having suggested what I thought was the obvious alternative - Out of the Blue: The inside story of Liz Truss and her astonishing rise (and fall) - I was surprised to read that the strapline had been changed to The inside story of Liz Truss and her explosive rise to power which seemed a bit ambiguous in light of her subsequent resignation.

However, after what were reported to be frantic rewrites and a new final chapter, the strapline has been changed again and this time it’s much closer to my suggestion which, to be fair, wasn’t rocket science.

Furthermore, and contrary to my expectations on October 16, Out of the Blue: The inside story of the unexpected rise and rapid fall of Liz Truss will not only meet its December publication date, it is currently due for release on November 24, two weeks ahead of schedule which is no mean feat.

The ebook is out even sooner. It’s available from Tuesday (November 1).

Credit then to the authors - the Sun’s Harry Cole and James Heale of The Spectator - for whom the last few weeks must have been trying to say the least. For that reason alone Out Of The Blue deserves to be a bestseller!

PS. The book is also being serialised in the The Times/Sunday Times.

Above: James Heale (left) with Will Lloyd, deputy editor of UnHerd, at the Forest Summer Lunch at Boisdale of Belgravia in July. Below: a recent tweet from Spectator editor Fraser Nelson. The article he refers to is well worth reading.

Ribble wibble

My wife and I are on an informal mission - to experience as many Michelin star restaurants as we can afford.

You can count the number we’ve been to on one hand but we’re working on it.

Oddly enough it’s not the food I tend to remember but the locations. So far we’ve been to Michelin restaurants in Lincolnshire, Fife, Cambridge and Bath and they have varied enormously and been memorable for different reasons.

I don’t have a favourite but I did enjoy the theatre of Midsummer House in Cambridge which had an open kitchen so diners could watch the food being prepared.

Menu Gordon Jones in Bath also had an open kitchen but what I most enjoyed was the size of the restaurant (very small) and the friendly informality. (The tiny premises were previously used by a florist, I believe.)

Rural Michelin restaurants are more likely, I imagine, to offer overnight accommodation which makes sense given that you will probably have driven there and will want to drink.

On Thursday we went to Northcote Hotel which is in the Ribble Valley in Lancashire. The original manor house dates back to 1884 but it’s been extended extensively since it became a hotel in the Eighties.

The restaurant was awarded a Michelin star in 1996 and has kept it ever since.

This post however is not about the hotel or the restaurant, excellent though they are, but the Ribble Valley.

I pride myself on having visited most parts of the UK from Land’s End to John O’Groats plus Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles, but the Ribble Valley, an area that includes the Forest of Bowland and covers parts of Lancashire and North Yorkshire, has somehow passed me by and I’m sure I’m not alone.

Rurally it’s one of the most beautiful areas I’ve seen, reminiscent of the Derbyshire and Yorkshire Dales but arguably more remote and unheralded despite boasting, in Dunsop Bridge, the ‘exact centre’ of the United Kingdom.

Following the directions suggested by Northcote Hotel we visited the ‘picturesque’ village of Whalley and the ‘bustling market town’ of Clitheroe but it was the drive through villages like Slaidburn and Whitewell, up Pendle Hill and into the Hodder Valley with its ‘wide and spectacular views’ of the Bowland Fells that really surprised me.

As the hotel website says, ‘This is a different aspect of Lancashire and one that is almost unknown outside the county.’

I would go further and suggest that, ignoring the car we were in, it was possible to imagine we were back in the pre-industrial world of the early 19th century.

I was tempted to keep this information to myself but given the number of people who read this blog I don’t suppose tourists will be flooding the area any time soon.

Nevertheless you read it here first.

Above and below: Northcote Hotel from the balcony of our room

Back to Blackpool

Just back from Glasgow via Blackpool, Lytham and the Ribble Valley.

The primary purpose of our mini break was to see my mother-in-law in Scotland but last Christmas my wife gave me a voucher for an overnight stay at a ‘luxury hotel and Michelin star restaurant’ in Lancashire and this week was one of the last opportunities to redeem it before it was out of date.

But first, Blackpool.

My wife had never been to Blackpool, which surprised me, so after staying at a b&b off the M6 on Wednesday night (more on that later) we followed the signs and eventually found ourselves in a line of slow-moving traffic on the famous Golden Mile.

There was rain in the air but it was half-term so the piers and promenade were awash with families and children.

The longest queue was outside the Blackpool Tower building above which rises the Tower. It’s also home to the Tower Ballroom which viewers of Strictly Come Dancing will be familiar with.

My first visit to Blackpool was in the late Seventies. My parents had moved from Scotland to Cumbria and one evening when I was home from university in Aberdeen we drove down to see the Illuminations that were devised, I believe, to attract visitors from October to December - in other words, beyond the traditional summer season.

I had never seen anything like it. Viewed after dark the Illuminations were hugely impressive.

But what left the biggest impression on me that night was the Pleasure Beach (‘the UK’s favourite amusement park’) with its Big Dipper and Grand National rollercoaster rides. Suffice to say, never again!!

Since then every visit to Blackpool has been work-related.

In the Nineties there was an event at the sprawling Norbreck Castle Hotel that I was contractually obliged to attend.

In the Noughties I went to several party conferences in Blackpool including the 2007 Conservative conference when Forest hosted a post smoking ban party with smokers crammed on to a small balcony overlooking a busy main road.

I wrote about it here (Morning after the night before) but the preceding post (Blackpool beached) is probably more pertinent:

To Blackpool for the Conservative party conference where, tomorrow night, we're hosting the second of our party conference receptions.

By all accounts, this is the last time any of the major parties will hold their conference in this part of Lancashire. The only surprise is that the Tories have come back for one last hurrah.

My first experience of Blackpool was as a wide-eyed teenager. I'll never forget my first sight of the colourful trams, the famous Illuminations, and - the most vivid memory of all - the Pleasure Beach with its terrifying rollercoasters!

Today, Blackpool has far less appeal. Much has been written about the hotels, the crumbling buildings and concrete promenade that hark back to a different age - and, sadly, it's all true. No-one in their right mind would come here for a holiday, far less a 21st century party political conference. What were the Conservatives thinking?!!

A bit harsh perhaps but since then and prior to this week I had been back to Blackpool just once.

In April 2011 I was invited to address the Clubs & Institute Union’s AGM in the Opera House. As I wrote here (The smell of freedom):

It was the first union meeting I have attended (I felt like a member of the Politburo as I sat on stage!) but I felt enormous warmth and a great sense of camararderie. Society has changed and working mens' clubs have been a victim of that change, but there is no sense in hastening their demise with unnecessary and petty legislation.

Often overlooked as an anachronism in the modern day, the working men’s clubs represented by the CIU suffered enormously from the impact of the smoking ban and other factors beyond their control and their numbers continue to fall.

It’s a world I knew very little about until I was invited to visit a working men’s club in Luton and that led to the CIU offering their support for Forest’s Save Our Pubs & Clubs campaign.

They even sent a delegation to a reception we organised on the terrace of the House of Commons in July 2011.

But that’s enough about the CIU, and Blackpool. You want to hear about Lytham and the Ribble Valley, right? Watch this space.

PS. The b&b off the M6 (junction 33) was a stunning barn conversion worthy of Grand Designs.

We had planned to have dinner at a nearby pub but having booked a table in advance we got a last minute email saying the pub would be closed so our booking was cancelled.

Our b&b hosts came to the rescue, offering a smorgasbord of local meats and cheeses plus homegrown tomatoes and other vegetables grown in their garden, all beautifully presented on a large platter.

There was wine too and breakfast was an even bigger triumph.

Warmly recommended.

Below: Our b&b barn conversion bedroom

So. Farewell then, Ford Fiesta

It’s been reported that Ford is to end production of the Fiesta, still one Britain’s most popular cars but now in its fifth decade.

I’ve owned two Fiestas, both of them XR2s which in the Eighties and early Nineties was the ‘hot hatch’ option.

My first Fiesta, a Mark II XR2, was mercury grey and had twin spotlights which gave it a very sporty look, or so I liked to think.

Launched in 1984, I bought it in December 1986 to replace my ageing Austin Metro whose rusty fuel tank had ruptured, leaving gallons of petrol on the A303 in Wiltshire.

I had intended to buy a Ford Escort XR3 but after test driving both the Escort and the Fiesta I fell instantly in love with the XR2.

It wasn’t the best car I’ve owned but it was arguably the most fun.

My favourite memory is taking it to North Wales where it was ideally suited to the sweeping country roads but it was no slouch on motorways either.

Sadly, five years after I bought it from a secondhand car dealer in south London it was stolen from outside my house in Camberwell and although I reported the theft to the police it was never found.

I wasn’t too upset though because I already had my eye on the Mk III Fiesta that had been launched in 1989 so I quickly replaced the stolen car with a one year old XR2i.

In hindsight it was probably a mistake because the new model was a completely different car and there were better hot hatches on the market like the Peugeot 205 GTI and the VW Golf GTI Mk2.

A design fault also meant the car became increasingly difficult to start until it wouldn’t start at all.

Every few months I’d call the AA who sent someone round to clean the offending part and everything would be fine until the same cycle repeated itself.

On another occasion the timing belt snapped causing the car to limp to a halt in the middle of Chiswick High Road.

Until then I had never heard of a timing belt or the serious damage a snapped belt could do to an engine.

Luckily I was travelling so slowly (about 10mph) when the belt snapped that the engine escaped serious damage.

Another problem with my ‘new’ Fiesta was the colour. It was bright red and I was warned that the police were more likely to stop a red car, especially if it was a hot hatch.

I was sceptical but within months I had been stopped twice and forced to stand by the side of the road while they contacted the DVLA to confirm that I was indeed the owner.

Like its predecessor the XR2i was also a magnet for thieves. The spare wheel, which sat on a bracket beneath the boot, was the first casualty.

Thieves subsequently smashed their way into the car via the tailgate and it was only the fact that they couldn’t get the engine started (that design fault again!) that stopped it being stolen like my first Fiesta.

Thankfully there were no problems starting the car on my wedding day in April 1992 when it got us to Skye (and back) without incident.

In fact I kept it for another two years until the birth of our first child meant something more grown up and spacious was required.

That said, my wife later owned her own (sixth generation) Fiesta and although it was a perfectly good car her subsequent choice, a Mini Cooper, has given her a lot more enjoyment.

Nevertheless I’ll always have fond memories of my own Fiestas, the MkII XR2 in particular.

See also: ‘Our window cleaner drives a Bentley‘.

Ford Fiesta fans on why they love their cars (BBC News)

Councillor tells ASH to butt out

It's all kicking off in Bristol. Two weeks ago it was reported that:

A South Bristol councillor has challenged a housing association to come up with a “more gritty” and relevant name for its new 70-home development after branding the original idea “ridiculous”.

Bishopsworth ward Cllr Richard Eddy says the proposal to call the road, at Imperial Park, 'Crox View' is meaningless because the name comes from an ancient woodland on the opposite side of the retail complex that residents can’t see – and can only be viewed from the air.

South Bristol councillor blasts "ridiculous" proposed new street name at former tobacco factory (Bristol Post)

If you're wondering why the story is of interest to me I should explain that the site was formerly the home of an Imperial Group tobacco factory and Cllr Eddy wanted the name to 'reflect the site’s history'.

Earlier this week it seemed that Cllr Eddy's plea had prevailed. Although council officers rejected his idea that the new road to be given an 'Imperial' prefix or named after former members of the Wills family, who founded the city’s tobacco trade, in case it caused confusion with 'existing Bristol streets that already have them', some alternative suggestions were proposed.

In a surprising but novel twist they were 'all based on the company’s old cigarette brands – Strand Road, Passing Clouds Road and Gold Flake Road' with Cllr Eddy and the housing association agreeing to the name Navy Cut Road.

South Bristol road to be named after cigarette brand instead of woodland (Bristol Post)

Inevitably ASH has weighed in with CEO Deborah Arnott arguing that the decision to name the road after a cigarette brand – albeit one that is no longer sold in this country – is "morally unacceptable".

The (Labour) Mayor’s office is now said to be reviewing the proposal so I don't hold out much hope for Navy Cut Road but I did enjoy Cllr Eddy's response to ASH's intervention:

“Bishopsworth is a plain-speaking, no-nonsense place and we don’t take kindly to politically correct busybodies pushing their noses into our affairs.

“The ‘woke’ warriors of ASH are nothing more than ignorant Leftie professional agitators and they should refrain from lecturing Bristolians as if we were uninformed and not grown-up.

Bristolians know our city boasts a ‘gritty’ identity based on manufacturing and trading and we should not shy away from acknowledging our past.

Cigarette-named road "morally unacceptable", anti-smoking campaigners say (Bristol Post)

With Truss gone, what next for her friend the Secretary of State for Health?

It was inevitable, I’m sorry to say. Recent events made her position untenable so Liz Truss had to go.

I just hope that her good friend, health secretary Thérèse Coffey, is still in her job after the PM’s successor is announced next week.

A report that Coffey was going to abandon the long-awaited tobacco control plan was one of the few positive stories to emerge in recent weeks, although I wasn’t entirely sure it was true.

Listening to Coffey on LBC a couple of weeks ago it was clear she hadn’t given tobacco control much thought, but that’s not the same as dropping plans for England to be ‘smoke free’ by 2030.

It just meant it wasn’t a priority, given everything else on her plate.

The signs were enough however to worry an impatient tobacco control industry not to mention their supporters at the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), hence the Guardian story that was clearly designed to put pressure on Coffey to act.

Likewise last week’s leading article in The Times, an opinion piece in the Guardian by former health minister Dr Dan Poulter (I’m a Tory MP, but I think Thérèse Coffey is putting ideology above the nation’s health), and some indignant tweets on social media that appeared to be driven not by ordinary members of the public but by anti-smoking groups desperate for the Khan recommendations to be implemented as part of the Government’s plan.

Sadly, and through no fault of her own, Coffey’s time at the DHSC could be cut almost as short as Truss’s term at Number Ten because my guess is that the new leader of the Conservative party may want a complete break from Truss’s closest friends and allies and that makes the health secretary extremely vulnerable.

If Coffey goes I suspect the job of health secretary will revert to the usual upwardly mobile politician for whom a tobacco control plan is a perfect opportunity to distract attention from the state of the NHS and stamp their mark before moving on to the next job.

When Thérèse Coffey was appointed I hoped that, finally, we had a Secretary of State for Health we could relate to.

More important, she struck me as someone who in return could relate to ordinary people - those of us who are neither paragons of virtue nor paragons of health.

Liz Truss may be history but Thérèse Coffey? Your country still needs you!