Londoner’s Diary
Former Tory MP Lee Anderson, who has had the whip withdrawn for Islamophobic comments about Sadiq Khan, is gleefully teasing about defecting to another party.
Last night he appeared on GB News, which pays him £100,000 as a presenter on top of his MP’s salary, to remind viewers he was once a Labour councillor and has been on “a political journey”. And, in what seemed like a veiled threat, he said he will stand at the next election whether the Tories want him or not.
The obvious berth for Anderson seems to be Reform UK. But will they have him? Leader Richard Tice has praised Anderson but others are sceptical. “Frankly I’m more concerned about death threats to our Rochdale candidate than internal Tory psychodrama,” a senior Reform party figure told us.
The party’s deputy leader, Ben Habib, said: “I would be quite circumspect about anyone who can’t express themselves accurately, clearly and in matters of great sensitivity… Lee clearly hasn’t got a grasp, in my view, of the language required to identify and address the problem.” A faultlessly polite way of saying loudmouth Lee is a liability. Reform claims it has already turned down two Tory MP defectors in the past year.
If Reform isn’t interested, there is always Reclaim, disgraced actor Laurence Fox’s party, who backed Anderson, saying he was “suspended for being a Conservative”.
The last MP to defect to Reclaim was Andrew Bridgen. Tough act to follow.
Get the Sam Cam look
While Lord Cameron is flying around the world from Paraguay to Poland, his wife Samantha is busy modelling her own clothing range. Sam Cam has become a fixture on her label Cefinn’s Instagram page, with the brand even starting the hashtag #samsstyle. They post caught-off-guard style videos of Lady Cameron on her phone before an employee says, “Hi Sam, what are you wearing today?”
Cefinn has had a boost with Lord Dave back in the limelight. Rishi Sunak’s wife Akshata wore a Cefinn dress to a No 10 fashion week drinks party last week, and Cefinn will be opening a flagship store in upmarket Belgravia in the coming months.
Pugh for PM
Florence Pugh plays a princess in this week’s big release, Dune: Part Two, because director Denis Villeneuve didn’t think it was much of a stretch from reality.
“He said when he met me that I was very regal and very royal,” said Pugh in an interview for the film yesterday. “Who was he actually meeting that day? Who was that? Because that wasn’t me,” she added humbly. Villeneuve also thought Pugh could “definitely” be in No 10 in the future. “I’m the prime minister,” Pugh jokes. In a Liz Truss biopic, perhaps? First we had Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady, so a starring role for Pugh in the Lettuce Lady isn’t beyond imagination.
