The Londoner: Kane's boys kick Brexit into touch

Brexit may clash with England game / Caitlin Moran refuses to go on Have I Got News For You / Philip Green NFI'd to biography launch / Brands fight over Melania's infamous parker / 
Brexit vs. Football: Theresa May:
Getty Images
28 June 2018

Theresa May’s crunch Brexit summit next week at Chequers could be derailed not by clashing ministers but by the real national interest: the England football team.

Ministers are already demanding TV screens be wheeled out so they can watch a possible England football match.

If Harry Kane and his teammates get the right set of results, they could be kicking off a World Cup quarter-final at 7pm on Friday, July 6, when Theresa May’s long-trailed “away day” summit could well be approaching a crescendo. “No one around the Prime Minister seemed to be aware that England may be playing while we were at Chequers,” one minister told us.

He added: “If there is no television there, the row over the Brexit white paper will be nothing compared to our fury that we can’t watch the match.”

The meeting is when the Cabinet’s position on the customs union should be decided. Cabinet ministers will do battle over exactly how we should leave the EU, with Leave ministers lining up against those who voted Remain.

May, who is more of a cricket fan than a football follower, is nonetheless keen to fly her patriotic flag — quite literally. St George’s Cross will be fluttering over Downing Street when England play Belgium tonight.

May herself will be behind enemy lines: she’s in Belgium for a European Council summit. But the Prime Minister faces a challenge managing clashes of egos and schedules.

“Downing Street have been made aware that this matters,” said a minister. “I have fed this into the system.”

Excuse for HIGNFY gents will appreciate

Will a creaky old television be brought out from the depths of Chequers? And could the English football team’s result affect the course of the nation by changing the summit’s mood?

A win might convince attendees of the country’s exceptionalism, a loss the realisation of our place in the pack of European nations. It’s all to play for.

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Author Caitlin Moran refuses to appear on Have I Got News For You. The BBC show has been labelled sexist after one of the team captains, Ian Hislop, claimed that women were “too modest” to join the male-centric panel. “They keep asking me,” Moran told James O’Brien’s podcast Unfiltered. “All the women I know who have appeared on the show have hated it. It’s like a urinal — it’s built for men. I could go on and try and use it, but I would end up getting piss all over my shoes and look very inelegant doing it.”

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Shane Warne says his memoir No Spin will tell all about how he has embraced therapy. “I speak openly about going to see psychologists,” says the Australian cricketer. “I’ve never revealed that before. I discuss some of the sessions and the things I was asked to do.” He also discusses his mother’s German roots: “They got on a boat they thought was going to America, but it was going to Australia.”

An alarmingly late night for Grimshaw as his Breakfast Show exit looms

Nick Grimshaw, who recently announced that he is to leave his Breakfast Show slot on BBC Radio 1, was at Serpentine restaurant Chucs last night with rock progeny Kelly Osbourne. “Time for a new show,” he said, announcing his departure from the breakfast slot, “and, most importantly, time for a new wake-up time... preferably about 11.30am.” Grimshaw and Osbourne were celebrating the launch of a new Wimbledon tennis kit from sports brands Palace and Adidas. Meanwhile, over in The City, actor Jaime Winstone and Soho heiress India Rose James were at the opening of new rooftop bar Savage Garden. The Australian pop band with the same name initially took issue: “The name Savage Garden had been used in a pretty public and global commercial way before,” they vented. The bar, its management might point out, is located just off Savage Gardens. Best to hold off with the lawsuits...

SW1A

Damian Marley: (Photo by Johnny Nunez/WireImage)
WireImage

An unlikely pairing in Parliament: Norman Lamb, Lib-Dem MP, welcomed Damian Marley, son of the late, great Lion of Zion, Bob Marley. Marley was there to discuss the legalisation of cannabis. “We use it as a spiritual sacrament and recreationally,” Marley told a symposium held in Portcullis House. “We have a saying in Jamaica: The herb is the healing of the nation’.” Perhaps it could help MPs come to terms with Brexit.

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A late entry to the auction at last night’s London Air Ambulance summer gala: the offer of tea and a game of the board game Diplomacy with Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson. Amid the alternatives of watches, fine wine and luxury holidays, it went for £4,500 and was the most talked about prize of the night. Some might argue that a more appropriate game for Boris would be Cards Against Humanity.

Quote of the day

‘Good thing it’s a three-line whip in Parliament, as the atmosphere at home will be unbearable’

Greg Hands MP, whose wife is German, wasn’t looking forward to getting home last night

Brands that do care

Why are brands battling to claim credit for Melania Trump’s tasteless “I really don’t care, do U?” jacket? The green parka, which she wore to a migrant children’s detention centre on the US-Mexico border last week, was from high street shop Zara. But brand R13, which offers a similar coat, says it “seems Zara found ‘inspiration’ from R13’s parka”. The plot thickens: in 2002, model Kate Moss wore an almost identical coat in i-D magazine. It was emblazoned with the slogan “God Save the Queen.” Maybe that was the message Melania should have gone for.

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AA Gill was celebrated last night with a special production of The Jungle, a play about refugees in Calais inspired by his trips. Actors Gwendoline Christie and Dougray Scott, below, were there, as was Martin Ivens, Gill’s Sunday Times’ editor, who said: “He would pretend I was the lofty intellectual and he the illiterate.”

Toasting A.A Gill: Dougray Scott
Dave Benett/Getty Images

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