Monday
Poor old Dave. If it wasn’t bad enough getting kicked out of Downing Street several months earlier than planned, he is now getting it in the neck for handing out a few gongs to his mates in his resignation honours list. Critics of Dave’s recipients seem to be rather missing the point. Apart from the odd lollipop lady and gold medal-winning Olympian, honours have always largely gone to the undeserving; MPs, high-ranking civil servants, judges and top brass in the armed forces. Honours are the Establishment’s way of rewarding the Establishment. The indignation that some people may be slightly more undeserving than others seems to be splitting hairs. Dominic Lawson in the Daily Mail was apoplectic that no Brexit supporters had been rewarded. He didn’t specifically demand knighthoods for George Galloway and Nigel Farage – those honours should be taken as read – but he did give Dominic Cummings, Vote Leave’s campaign director, a name check. This is the Dominic Cummings who was described by one MP as having “no grip on reality at all” and who behaved like a spoiled five-year-old when asked to provide accurate financial information to support the Brexit case. Compared to Cummings, most of Dave’s appointees seem like grandees.
Tuesday
After the opening of the two-part play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child to five-star reviews, JK Rowling announced: “I think we’re done with Harry Potter now.” I wouldn’t be so sure, as Rowling has form for going back on her word. When the seventh book in the series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, was published in 2007 Rowling also declared that was that as far as HP was concerned. Since then she has written Tales of Beedle the Bard, an HP add-on and a film script of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, along with regular updates to her Pottermore website. Letting go of a creation is never easy. Arthur Conan Doyle thought he had dispensed with Sherlock Holmes at the Reichenbach Falls only to have to bring him back from the dead a few years later due to public demand. In literature, some characters can never be allowed to die. Give it a few years and Harry Potter and the Cursed Grandchild will be premiering in the West End.
Wednesday
Most people find their holiday arrangements relatively straightforward. They go away with family or friends. Or, if they happen to be a recluse, on their own. Celebrities seem to do things rather differently, judging by the holiday photographs being published in the tabloids now that August is here and there is less news to fill the pages. How else to explain the fact that Sir David Tang, Kate Moss and Sarah Ferguson are all on holiday together? I know this year is an exceptional case as many minor celebs have presumably had to hurriedly inform Sir Philip Green that they won’t be able to make it to the Med for a couple of weeks on his brand-new £90m yacht, BHSWHO, but even so? In what possible world are Tang, Moss and Fergie besties? I’ve long imagined that – in a fantasy world not dissimilar to Harry Potter’s – there’s a central casting agency which ranks every celebrity from an A to a D and specialises in matching people of equal rank. It’s a world that runs with the secrecy of the masons, and when you are lucky enough to have made it to a grade D, you are given a list of other grade Ds whom you are allowed to socialise with and date.
Thursday
The Ukip leadership campaign is proving to be every bit as entertaining and divisive as Labour’s, now that the frontrunner, Steven Woolfe, has managed to eliminate himself by submitting his nomination forms 17 minutes after the official deadline. Woolfe had well over a week in which to fill in a basic form – name, age, address, phone number – but somehow never managed to get round to it. While most people who have their hearts set on a particular job fall over backwards to get in their applications on time – even the dopiest student manages to get the UCAS forms in before the cut-off point – Woolfe reckoned he had better things to do. Watch TV, go for a drink with Nigel, work out whether to include the drink-driving conviction: that kind of thing. Woolfe’s omission won’t go down well with many Ukip diehards, most notably Arron Banks, the multi-millionaire who has been the party’s largest donor for years and is not enamoured of the touchy-feely-not-all-foreigners-are-bastards Ukip wing. If Ukip does manage to elect one of the Ukip-lite candidates, such as Lisa Duffy, don’t rule out a split in the party.
Friday
The Ed Stone has been found. Ed Miliband’s two-tonne, 8ft 6in-high stone tablet with six commandments written on it that he unveiled during the last weekend of the 2015 general election – “1. A nicer place for everyone. 2. A country where everyone is a bit happier than they were yesterday” etc – was not smashed to pieces in embarrassment as had been widely supposed. Instead, it has just been turned over and recycled by Jeremy Corbyn. The Labour leader’s most recent announcement in the contest to get himself re-elected has been to make 10 pledges to the country. While these contain marginally more detail than Miliband’s – the writing on the stone is a wee bit smaller – they all seem remarkably similar. 1. A nicer place for everyone, with everyone who wants a job being able to have one because we are going to make sure they can by creating a new bank with lots of money. 2. A country where everyone is a bit happier than they were yesterday because we are going to build one million homes in next to no time and renationalise the railways so everyone can get where they want to a lot quicker especially if they live in Brighton. 3. A country where everything is much more equal, fairer and just. 4. A peaceful country where everyone who wants to be able to learn how to sing can do so. Plus ça change.
Digested week, digested: Dave’s £225 swimming trunks.
