• Commiserations to culture minister Ed Vaizey, who was dropped by Theresa May on Friday evening after six years in the role. He confirmed the news of his own “Vexit” on Twitter, saying he was “looking forward to supporting the government from the backbenches”.
Looking forward to supporting the government from the backbenches #vexit
— Ed Vaizey (@edvaizey) July 15, 2016
The affable Tory MP managed to break the record for the longest-serving arts minister in May – beating Jennie Lee’s run in the 60s – and made friends throughout the creative industries along the way. Among the media names paying tribute on Twitter were Simon Schama, Pat Younge, the National Theatre, Sandi Toksvig, Miranda Sawyer and Louise Mensch.
@edvaizey dear Ed - an artsfelt thankyou
— Simon Schama (@simon_schama) July 16, 2016
@edvaizey This is sad news. Driven real change on diversity after years of inaction, also a decent bloke. @LennyHenry #keepupthepressure
— pat younge (@tcmbigcheese) July 16, 2016
Huge thanks to @edvaizey, who as the UK’s longest serving arts minister has been a tireless advocate for culture and the arts.
— National Theatre (@NationalTheatre) July 16, 2016
@edvaizey We'll miss you. You did good listening, and that's so needed, and so rare. Thank you.
— toksvig (@toksvig) July 16, 2016
@edvaizey Oh Ed, that is a shame. Thank you for all your brilliant work for the arts
— Miranda Sawyer (@msmirandasawyer) July 15, 2016
@edvaizey approximately 18 months is a short time in politics. You were only minister I was ever jealous of. You will be missed v much. xxx
— Louise Mensch (@LouiseMensch) July 15, 2016
Vaizey will be replaced by West Suffolk MP Matthew Hancock, who was previously the minister for the cabinet office and paymaster general. He will work alongside new culture secretary Karen Bradley, who replaced John Whittingdale on Thursday.
• Bradley can apparently claim to have already made an impact in the media, however. While part of Theresa May’s Home Office team, she is credited (together with Margot James MP) with “converting” her senior colleague Nicholas Soames “to the joys of Twitter” – and Fatty Soames has never looked back, subjecting fellow-Tories and Labour shadow ministers alike to a stream of robustly worded tweeted tirades.
• Monkey guessed The Night Manager, others more plausibly went for War & Peace – but in the end the keynote, brand-moulding image on the front of the BBC’s annual report, published last week, was the announcement of the winner in the Great British Bake Off: a fine advert for DG Tony Hall’s commitment to diversity, as the photo includes not only Nadiya Hussain but also Tamal Ray, and (with Paul Hollywood and Mary Berry pictured too) a decent mix of ages. War & Peace, with its all-white and often posh set of characters, had to be content with the covers of both the separate brochures for BBC Worldwide and financial statements, while the spy drama was, er, not very prominent at all. On that basis, the Beeb’s latest prestige adaptation, of Joseph Conrad’s The Secret Agent (which began on Sunday), will be lucky if a single small photo of it appears at the back of the Worldwide report. Possibly dreamt up before Hall started to enthuse about properly representing women and minorities, it threatens to wreck his percentages – of around 10 police officers, anarchists and others in its main cast, only Vicky McClure’s Winnie is a woman, and none of them is non-white (though one is disabled). Tricky stuff, costume drama.
• The risks, even potentially libellous ones, of live TV subtitling apparently based on an audio version of predictive text (sometimes, but not always, quickly revised by human beings) were evident again during the hurly-burly of what the Times called “the day of the short stilettos”, aka the announcement of Theresa May’s first cabinet. Watching it unfold on Sky News without sound in the gym, Monkey saw one political reporter quoted as saying “one of the first things [May] will do is have a security breach”, and another mysteriously said of her former colleague Joey Jones (now in Downing Street in her comms team) that he is “one of her ketamine occasions advisers”. Monkey can only pray the new PM and her spinner are spared any such ketamine occasions, at least while she’s still getting used to the job.
• This article was amended on 18 July 2016 to replace previously published text that appeared due to a technical error with the correct copy.
- An item was removed from this column on 19 July 2016 because it mistakenly claimed that the LBC drivetime host Iain Dale had told the Media Masters podcast that “5 Live is my station of choice to listen to” and “it would be my dream to be on 5 Live”. A link to the podcast was provided, but the writer did not listen to the interview. In it, Dale talks in the past tense. He says 5 Live “was” his station of choice and it “would have been” his dream job. He makes clear that he now regards his LBC job as being far preferable given the editorial freedoms it allows him. Apologies to Iain Dale.
