BLACK DOG: Sexting Simon Danczuk is off message

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Could Simon Danczuk be the new Nigel Farage? The colourful MP, who has been suspended from the Labour Party for more than ten months over allegations of ‘sexting’ a teenager, has told friends he will do something ‘drastic’ if his case is not resolved soon, such as switching to the Kippers and forcing a by-election. ‘His Rochdale constituency is a Ukip heartland, and he would instantly become the leadership favourite,’ a chum warns. Don’t rule it out – Ukip likes hard-drinking mavericks with controversial private lives…

The colourful MP Simon Danczuk, who has been suspended from the Labour Party for more than ten months over allegations of ‘sexting’ a teenager

Theresa May’s risqué quip about how the wife of MP Peter Bone might celebrate his birthday brought to mind how Margaret Thatcher cried with laughter when Falstaffian Tory and ladies’ man Geoffrey Dickens refused to be interrupted during a rambling speech on women’s rights. The Speaker said: ‘I am trying to do the Honourable Gentleman a favour!’ Dickens ploughed on: ‘Mr Speaker, I want to do every woman in Britain a favour!’ 

Wisecracking Alan bearly raises a smile

There was bafflement at the Foreign Office last week when Boris Johnson’s deputy, Alan Duncan, welcomed a delegation from the Peruvian government by cracking jokes about Paddington Bear. Cue blank stares from the group from South America, who had clearly not read Michael Bond’s children’s classic about the mischievous bear from ‘deepest, darkest Peru’.

There was bafflement at the Foreign Office last week when Boris Johnson’s deputy, Alan Duncan, welcomed a delegation from the Peruvian government by cracking jokes about Paddington Bear

Like many newly unemployed people, David Cameron is struggling to fill his days. To avoid getting under SamCam’s feet, he has found solace in the elite Carlton Club, a Conservative Party bastion since 1832. The former PM has been spotted stretched out on the club’s terrace while he works on official-looking papers – guarded by a giant club official put there to stop other members from pestering him about Europe. 

A blast from the past 

Tory MP Andrew Rosindell wants a return to those halcyon days when the BBC played a stirring rendition of the national anthem at the close of each evening’s programmes. Rosindell – as British as roast beef – is drawing up a Commons amendment to compel the Corporation to reinstate the tradition as a display of ‘post-Brexit patriotism’. Hmmm. 

It has not gone unnoticed by friends of Bolton North East Labour MP David Crausby that one of ambitious Bolton South East Labour MP Yasmin Qureshi’s first acts on joining Corbyn’s front bench was to support a Tory proposal. What was the idea by the despised Conservatives that Jezza’s new girl found so seductive? A proposal to change her constituency boundaries, giving her a large chunk of extra Labour voters from Crausby’s seat. A handy bolt-on, you might say. 

Paddy Ashdown is still bristling with alpha-male confidence at the age of 75. The former Liberal Democrat leader is so proud of the produce from his Somerset garden that he is planning to take a local horticultural show by storm. Says the veteran ladies’ man: ‘You should see the size of my onions.’