The Londoner: Jeremy Corbyn has a go at the ‘nasty' media

Corbyn speaks out about "daily harassment" / Tom Daley wins over the in-laws/ Jeremy Hunt on being "superman"/ Hotel California comes to Westminster
Porkies by omission: Jacob Rees-Mogg
Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images
3 June 2019

JEREMY Corbyn has spoken out about the “daily harassment” and “nastiness” that he and his colleagues face, decrying the pressures of “having your house staked out by the media” and “your privacy interfered with”.

Speaking at a Labour Party event in Leeds at the weekend, Corbyn paid tribute to shadow home secretary Diane Abbott “and all others who stand up for our movement, despite the nastiness that is thrown at them by some of the mainstream media". In a video posted on Abbott’s Instagram, the Labour leader appeared to be speaking from personal experience as he railed at the “daily harassment of having your house staked out by the media trying to grab hold of you when you don’t want the media grabbing hold of you and you don’t want your privacy being interfered with”.

It is the most recent indication of mounting pressure on the Labour leader, amid deep Brexit divisions, poor polling and calls for him to resign following the party’s performance in the European elections. He is now weathering a new storm after it was alleged on Sunday that his office had blocked the suspension of a senior aide accused of sexual harassment by a female Labour MP.

While indicating that “nastiness” from the press is taking a toll on him personally, Corbyn focused his comments on Abbott. He said she has been “absolutely outstanding” in furthering the cause of “anti-racism, of a multicultural, multiracial society”, despite the “rubbish” she faces. “I just think we ought to say thank you,” he added, as the audience broke into applause.

A Conservative critic says "it's time Corbyn realises that being asked questions by the media is part of the job."

But it is not just Labour politicians who are being doorstepped. Michael Gove, Boris Johnson and Amber Rudd are frequently filmed and interviewed outside their homes. Recent photos of Gove showed him dodging photographers while jogging outside his Earl's Court home. The price of fame....

Rees-Mogg's guilty of a sin of omission

Porkies by omission: Jacob Rees-Mogg
Dan Kitwood/Getty Images

JACOB Rees-Mogg may have written a book about upstanding Victorians, but he’s not averse to a little chicanery himself. Praise for Rees-Mogg’s book on Amazon features a quote from Times columnist Matthew Parris that reads: “A fine philosophical mind”. The line ran in a 2017 column but that wasn’t all Parris said: “His manners are perfumed but his opinions are poison. Rees-Mogg is quite simply an unfailing, unbending, unrelenting reactionary. His record on every moral, social, sexual or reproductive issue I’ve looked at is brute moral Conservative.”

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Tottenham Hotspur have issued a statement criticising George Galloway, after the former Labour MP celebrated Liverpool’s victory over Spurs in Saturday’s Champions League final by saying there would be “no Israel flags on the cup”. The statement said: “It’s astounding in this day and age to read such blatant anti-Semitism.”

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Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary and leadership hopeful, used to sneak out of the Commons after voting to one of London’s “fantastic zouk lambada” dance clubs. “We used to have the last vote at 10pm and I would have a T-shirt under my shirt,” he says. “Arrive at half past ten. Take off the suit. Like Superman.”

The Firths have fun as the sun goes down on Sundance

COLIN and Livia Firth brought a touch of glamour to the last night of the Sundance Film Festival in London yesterday, as they turned up for the premiere of After the Wedding, which stars Julianne Moore and Michelle Williams.

The film’s director, Bart Freundlich, who is Moore’s husband, made up the third part of the starry trio at Picturehouse Central in Piccadilly.

Also there was director Sophie Hyde with actors Alia Shawkat and Holliday Grainger. Hyde has directed The Animals, an adaption of Emma Jane Unsworth’s 2014 novel about two fun-loving girls who live in Dublin. The actors met in fitting circumstances: “I was really drunk when I met Alia for the first time,” Grainger has said. “It was straight in at the deep end.”

As well as actors and directors the festival also proved a draw for influencers like designer Florence Given.

SW1A

AS BORIS Johnson launches his leadership campaign today, Jacqui Smith, a former home secretary, recalls chairing a meeting with the then London Mayor ahead of the 2012 Olympics. Johnson “turned up 35-40 minutes late. He acted as if... we were going to go over it all again with him,” she tells her For the Many podcast. “No we weren’t — and that was that.”

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TORY MPs were still lurking around Westminster during last week’s recess, waiting to be tapped up by leadership campaigns. One researcher sensed a Hotel California vibe: “We can check out any time we like, but we may never leave.”

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SAJID Javid’s campaign has received £10,000 from Howard Shore, chairman of Shore Capital — the company where Javid’s new head of campaigns, Matthew Elliott, ex-Vote Leave chief, is a senior political adviser. Javid has also hired former Sun PR man Andy Silvester for his comunications.

Tom's a smart cookie with his in-laws

LANCE Black, the American Oscar-winning screenwriter and husband of Tom Daley, recalls how the world champion and Olympic diver won over his conservative Southern mother.

“Tom came out to my mum’s house at Christmas and used my grandmother’s rolling pin to roll out the cookies for Christmas,” he told Radio 4. By the time Daley left, Black knew he had made an impact on the family.

“I later caught my mum with her little iPad. And she was Google-image-searching pictures of Tom in his Speedos. Like mother, like son…”

Quote of the Day

Tory MP Justine Greening brushes off the Brexit Party’s Ann Widdecombe, who says science could “produce an answer” to being gay

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