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The Londoner has learned that Boris Johnson’s appearance on the BBC’s flagship political programme The Andrew Marr Show yesterday may have been driven by broadcast rivalry.
Following public outrage at the fact that the Prime Minister refused to be grilled by Andrew Neil, the Marr programme had initially banned him from the show. On Friday morning, BBC sources said: “He won’t be doing Marr until we have confirmed and announced a date for the Neil interview.”
Yet on Saturday lunchtime, it was announced Johnson would now be a guest on Marr as a result of Friday’s terror incident at London Bridge. But it appears that there may have more behind the U-turn than the “public interest”. We have learned that when Johnson was stood down by Marr, Sky spotted an opportunity and invited the Prime Minister to take part in a sit-down interview with Sophy Ridge on her show, Ridge on Sunday. We understand that negotiations between Sky and Downing Street were well advanced when the BBC announced its change of plan.
A source tells us “the prospect of the Prime Minister turning up on Sky would have played a part”. A BBC source told us: “We decided it wasn’t in the public interest to ban the Prime Minister from our airwaves after a terror attack.”
The decision to allow Johnson back on the show has invited more controversy. Former controller of editorial policy, Phil Harding, who used to write BBC editorial guidelines, tweeted: “Really? Having said they wouldn’t allow Johnson to choose between Neil and Marr the BBC now appears to have given way. Attacks now election issue. If they wanted interview should have been Home Secretary.”
Relations with broadcasters are frosty. Last week No 10 threatened to review Channel 4’s broadcasting remit after it replaced Johnson with an ice block when he refused to appear on its climate change debate. There is still no news on whether he will face Andrew Neil. Don’t hold your breath.
Swinson swansong?
Is Jo Swinson at risk of losing her East Dunbartonshire seat? Katy Gordon, chair of the Liberal Democrat leader’s re-election campaign, sent a desperate email to supporters last week begging for help on the doorstep.
Pointing to a YouGov MRP poll predicting a close call with the Scottish National Party, Gordon wrote: “I need you to come and help Jo keep her seat... Please don’t tell us you mean to come, just come,” she said. Swinson lost her seat to the SNP in 2015 before winning it back in 2017. Gordon signed off: “Yours anxiously.”
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Robbie Williams explains why he’s done a festive advert for Aldi featuring character Kevin the Carrot. “As you get older and you are a middle-aged pop star, the road narrows and you have to do these things,” the Angels singer told an audience at the BBC for a Radio 2 concert on Friday. Hope he hasn’t told Kevin what happens to him at Christmas dinner.
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Sir David Attenborough has admitted: “I haven’t stopped flying.” The nonagenarian naturalist told Australian TV: “I would hesitate to travel a long way for a purely trivial purpose but if I’m travelling to do something, to make a programme about climate change, I think that’s justified.” If anyone can fly to save the planet, Sir David can.
Almodóvar’s delight Brits share his pain
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Pedro Almodóvar may have won five Baftas but he remains grateful that the British like his films at all. During a Bafta Screenwriters’ Lecture in London over the weekend, where he had come on a tour to promote his new feature, Pain and Glory, the veteran Spanish filmmaker said: “I’m overwhelmed that my movies worked well here, because, really, our cultures are very different.
“At the beginning I thought they’d be too outrageous for the British audience.” Almodóvar added that he’s never tried to outrage anyone — “Not in the sense for example that Madonna tried to be all the time outrageous.” Zing.
Look who's acting up at the Ivy...
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The tables turned in the Ivy last night as the great and the good of British theatre waited on guests for One Night Only, an event run by charity Acting for Others. A host of famous names made the occasion, but it was the staff who were the stars. Imelda Staunton, maître d’ for the evening, beamed to The Londoner: “I’m made for this,” explaining she’d got the knack from her family for making people feel at ease. “My mum was a hairdresser and she made conversation all day.” Downton actor Laura Carmichael admitted her acting work helped “because I’ve been Lady Edith, people do cut me a lot of slack because they think it’s the first time I’ve opened a bottle of wine”.
Less elated was Sheila Hancock, who bemoaned her “demotion” from maître d’ to hostess. Now she had to be “all sweetness and light”, she explained, while last year, as a maître d’, she’d been “bossy, very bossy... I was too bossy”.
SW1A
Sandi Toksvig and Emily Thornberry led a cross-party canvass with a difference in Canterbury at the weekend. Labour candidate Rosie Duffield, whose majority in 2017 was just 187, was the recipient of a unique style of campaigning: “Short, round women for Rosie,” said Thornberry. Bake Off host Toksvig, representing the Women’s Equality Party, joked, “if I’m round, blame Channel 4”.
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Jeremy Corbyn was stopped from addressing a rally in York yesterday by heavy traffic. Local Labour candidate Rachael Maskell led crowds singing “Prime Minister Corbyn” and blamed Tory roads policy for the congestion. Not the kind of jam Jeremy usually likes.
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Helle Thorning-Schmidt, ex-Danish PM and wife of Labour’s Stephen Kinnock, posted a photo of “Rudolf” nuzzling up to her husband. Labour colleague Carolyn Harris surmised the reindeer was attracted by Kinnock’s beard. He disagreed: “I thought it was my animal magnetism.”
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QUOTE OF THE DAY
'A woman just wouldn’t get away with that’
Nicola Sturgeon on Boris Johnson’s "bumbling” interview with Andrew Marr
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