One suspects that Theresa Villiers will be unhappy to discover what a bunch of Tory youths did with one of her ministerial red boxes. Come to think of it, the Northern Ireland Secretary might be in trouble, too – aren’t ministers supposed to take care of them? A snout whispered that a mob from the youth group Conservative Future found the box at Villiers’s Chipping Barnet Conservative Association offices following a talk by Peter Lilley MP. Unable to open the case, the excitable Boris minors took it to the nearby Ye Olde Monken Holt pub and posed for photographs on social media before thinking better of it and deleting the snaps. My informant saw one picture of a young Tory holding the box aloft. The next generation of Cons is as stupidly arrogant as the old.
Nick Clegg’s election chief, Paddy Ashdown, revels in his Action Man image but the former Royal Marine met his match on a train to London after the 2 April TV debate. Outgunned and outnumbered, the Lib Dem peer was forced to surrender to a Yorkshire hen party in fancy dress. On this occasion, a radar-lugged snout was settling down to hear Ashdown discussing campaign strategy on his phone when the carriage filled up with shrieking lasses. Captain Paddy hastily terminated the call with a giggly: “Save me! Save me!”
“Get it sorted!” is Ed Miliband’s most used phrase when on visits to Labour Party HQ on Brewer’s Green, barely a shout away from Westminster. Staff are instructed to keep his battle bus stocked with Pret A Manger sandwiches. You can take the socialist out of Hampstead . . . I’m told his favourite is the BLT. There’s a “no photos” edict.
Back on the train, Captain Paddy looked on open-mouthed as the Yorkshire hen party drank Cava for breakfast and noisily told lewd stories. “Just imagine what they’ll be like by the time they get to London,” a rueful Ashdown muttered to his companion. “This is going to be the journey from hell.”
The Tory wannabe and barrister Anna Firth isn’t the sharpest tool in the election campaign kit. Decamping to Labour-held Erith and Thamesmead after failing to secure her party’s nomination for the November 2014 Rochester by-election, Firth has made litter her big issue. She posted fewer pictures of rubbish, though, after rivals noted that most were taken in the constituency’s Bexley wards – where Tories run the council and are responsible for street cleaning.
One of the hens eventually recognised Ashdown. A glass of Cava was thrust into his hand. Selfies were taken. “Is he the stripper?” one asked. Cue more cheering. Paddy Pantsdown kept his trousers on. He looked terrified.
Kevin Maguire is the associate editor (politics) of the Daily Mirror
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