All the gossip from the Westminster village

The Father of the Nation is on a party offensive to cheer up the glum troops. Gordon Brown tipped up at wee Dougie Alexander's 40th birthday gig in a Soho club, where the man-boy development secretary was exposing a little raver hiding inside that anorak. He hired trendy Radio 1 DJ Edith Bowman to spin a few discs. Uncle Gordie shuffled on the dance floor but my snout with the piña colada didn't see him swivel his hips to Blondie and Soft Cell. The premier shouldn't expect a call to join a celebrity episode of Strictly Come Dancing, though GMTV tiny terror Kate Garraway might be relieved that there's a worse dancer in Britain.

If mobile phones pose a health threat, "Boy George" Osborne is a gonner. The hyperactive right-hand side of David Cameron's brain is ringing lobby hacks so regularly that some now groan when his name and number pop up. Your correspondent was lolling in a radio studio when the scribbler stalker arrived to accuse Uncle Gordie of every political crime short of eating babies. After his rant, Boy George took off the cans, smirked, then mumbled "very generous as usual", before legging it out of the door to pursue his fatwa.

Uncle Gordie also popped up at Hattie Harperson's bash in Portcullis House to mark her 25 years in the Mock Gothic Fun Palace. Labour's deputy leaderene enjoyed his fulsome praise so much that she decided to top it. "This is the biggest gathering yet of the Gordon Brown fan club," oozed Harperson. They didn't know whether to laugh or cry, so they looked at their feet.

Gold-coated Jack "the Lad" Straw put on a magnificent display of grovelling for the Queen, a republican reintroducing the deferential practice of walking backwards at the Ruritanian opening of parliament. The Blackburn boy looked fetching in his breeches, though not quite as charming as when he watches his local footie team on cold winter days. Jack of the Rovers, I gather, wears his wife's old tights under his trousers at Ewood Park.

Whelan's revenge is to be taken on Pepsi Kid Alan Milburn. Charlie W's first act as the Unite union's political commissar is to axe a £1,500 annual subsidy for little Alan's Darlington backyard. Nothing to do with Milburn's past clashes with Whelan's old boss Uncle Gordie, I'm sure. The Pepsi Kid gets £25K a year from taking the Cola challenge so he could always afford to dip his hand into his own pocket.

Silvikrin Kid Cameron's grey flecks have strangely disappeared, reviving speculation the Tory boy-man dyes his barnet. Still, at the rate it's disappearing, no amount of colour or spray may prevent him resembling Tyke baldie William Hague in 2010. Perhaps a 2007 election might have been kinder.

Kevin Maguire is associate editor (politics) of the Daily Mirror

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