The war of words between David Cameron and Lord Ashcroft has continued, with the Prime Minister reportedly comparing the former Tory deputy chairman's claims of widespread drug-taking and obscene sexual behaviour in his youth to "a stab in the back".
Lord Ashcroft's Call Me Dave, co-authored by the journalist Isabel Oakeshott, has created a media frenzy with claims from a contemporary of Mr Cameron's at university and current MP that the Prime Minister put his genitals in a dead pig's mouth as part of an initiation ceremony for an elite dining club at Oxford university.
Downing Street has publicly refused to "dignify" the book with a response to any of the stories in it, but privately Mr Cameron has dismissed allegations that he put his genitals in a dead pig's mouth as "utter nonsense".
And last night the Prime Minister apparently compared his feud with the prolific Tory donor to visiting the doctor.
According to the BBC he told guests at a Conservative party fundraising dinner at the Carlton Club that he was forced to go to the doctor for an aching back, caused by over-energetic wood chopping in his Cotswold s constituency.
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He explained how the doctor had told him he would need an injection and asked Mr Cameron to lie on his front. "This will just be a little prick, just a stab in the back," the doctor said, to which the Prime Minister joked that it "rather summed up my day".
Lord Ashcroft responded to the anecdote this afternoon, mocking the Prime Minister by tweeting: "Good to see PM retains his sense of humour. We must have the same doctor. I had the same in 2010 when the PM reneged."
The pair fell out after Mr Cameron failed to make good on an alleged promise to give Lord Ashcroft a top job after he became Prime Minister in 2010.
Good to see PM retains his sense of humour. We must have the same doctor. I had the same in 2010 when the PM reneged http://t.co/yKeiZDEOE7
— Lord Ashcroft (@LordAshcroft) September 22, 2015
Lord Ashcroft was the biggest Tory donor when Mr Cameron was elected leader in 2005 and the new Tory leader called on his advice and funds to help him reinvent the party into an electable force.
The peer claims Mr Cameron promised a much more senior job than the junior whip role he was eventually offered when the Tories entered government. He turned it down and the feud between the pair was born.
Read more:
David Cameron can 'make a pig sigh' by scratching its back and 'castrate a ram with a pair of pliers'
David Cameron accused of drug-taking, sexual promiscuity and an obscene act with a pig - but how much of it is true?
David Cameron 'stepped in to save constituent from hunting conviction,' book claims
David Cameron nearly sacked George Osborne in 2008, new book claims
Dead pig allegations are 'utter nonsense,' David Cameron tells friends
David Cameron says he 'will not dignify' claims he put his genitals in the mouth of a dead pig
Mr Cameron deemed Lord Ashcroft a liability due to his non-dom tax status. But the peer hit back, cutting off his funding of the party, setting up his own political polling company - publishing data previously only the Tories had - and embarking on his own book on the Tory leader.
The extracts of Call Me Dave are being serialised in the Daily Mail, with the book due to be published next month.
