Since the first stage of unlocking in March, MPs have received almost £23,000 in free hospitality tickets and other goodies, Guido can reveal. Nine MPs – mostly Tory – participated in the trial BRITs audience, racking up a total £7,925 in tickets and hospitality. All in order to receive a lecture from Dua Lipa slamming Boris and the lack of nurses’ pay rises…

Sports events have proved most popular, with Michael Gove’s jaunt to Porto with his son costing Santander £2,500. Philip Davies, Esther McVey and Alex Norris managed to wangle tickets plus hospitality to the England versus Czech Republic game on the 22nd June – freebies worth £4,612.8 between the three.

Philip Davies and Esther McVey also enjoyed Royal Ascott, with Davies nabbing an additional solo visit with the hospitality box included (£1,400).

It’s not just sports and music – these are MPs after all. LibDem Munira Wilson has bagged a free £1,463 National Liberal Club membership, not to mention the numerous Tory MPs who’ve bagged free Carlton club membership over the past year. As ever, very nice work if you can get it… 

The register declarations in full:

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Polls are now open in the Batley & Spen by-election, and the Tories aren’t the only ones hoping they’ll storm to victory. In a rare moment of bipartisan consensus, the TrotsApp crowd are also quite openly banking on a Labour car-crash – and using it as an opportunity to ram through a more left-wing candidate in any looming leadership challenge. The Socialist Campaign Group are even reported to have met last night to discuss the best strategy for capitalising on the loss. Brace for crocodile tears over the result come tomorrow morning…

Inevitably Owen Jones is at the front of the pack. Ever since Labour lost in Hartlepool, Owen’s been beating the drum for a far-left takeover of the party, and now he’s made his big pitch:

“If Labour lose the Batley and Spen by election, Starmer will have to resign…if Keir Starmer resigns, then you need 20 MPs, and the left would then have a very good chance at putting a candidate forward. A lot of people would say John McDonnell would be the obvious candidate in that particular circumstance.”

Yes, John McDonnell is the man to help rebuild the Red Wall he helped destroy in 2019. Obviously. 

Team Novara’s not far behind, with Aaron Bastani saying “Keir Starmer is now the worst person, at the worst moment, to lead the Labour Party“, and claiming George Galloway “could leave Starmer staring into the abyss”. Ash Sarkar also declared “it would be disastrous to put Keir Starmer in post until the next general election”. It’s certainly been amusing to watch them all pretend they’re really unhappy about Galloway’s arrival…

Then there are the MPs. Diane Abbott’s already suggested “it must surely be curtains” for Starmer if Labour lose, Angela Rayner is doing her best to act like she’s not about to mount a leadership challenge, and even Lisa Nandy is thinking of giving it another go. And to think this by-election was all about “local issues”…

Shadow Leader of the House of Commons Thangam Debbonaire slammed former Health Secretary Matt Hancock whilst sporting a £65 floral green dress from retailer Oliver Bonas – a store owned by the betrayed husband of Hancock’s lover, Gina Coladangelo. Meta…

During Business Questions in the Commons chamber, Debbonaire accused Hancock of hypocrisy over the Neil Ferguson affair and claimed he’d flouted “rules on procurement”. She added that Hancock was “handing out contracts to dodgy mates [and] let down staff and residents of care homes with his not really a ring of protection around them.” A real dressing-down…

Debbonaire also asked why Hancock handed out PPE contracts to his own pub landlord, owner of the unfortunately-named Cock Inn.  She’s not going to let the government skirt around these issues forever…

The Mail’s deputy political editor Tobyn Andreae has told the BBC’s Media Show podcast that the paper wouldn’t re-run their infamous “enemies of the people” headline today, implying it was a mistake they’d try avoiding nowadays:

“I suspect not every editor makes their own judgments. And of course, it’s always great to be wise with hindsight; would Paul Dacre use the same headline again? I can’t speak for him. He was a tremendously gifted editor from whom I learned an awful lot. But it’s a fast paced newsroom. Sometimes mistakes do get made. I can’t promise they won’t ever get made again.”

Andreae defended “kicking down as well as punching up”, for example going after benefit cheats, and it being as fair game as the Matt Hancock scoop, though saying they’re in a different category and the paper would “balance that out in the way those stories are presented”.

Sun editor-in-chief Victoria Newton was also asked whether the paper’s “not averse to a bit of kicking down”, she parried:

“I’m not sure that’s entirely fair. I mean, I think I edit the paper in a different way to perhaps some of my predecessors. I make it my conscious decision to work with people on stories a lot of the time. And, you know I have brilliant relationships with many celebrities and their agents.”

Guido wonders what James Slack, the former Daily Mail hack whose byline was on the ‘Enemies of the People’ splash, would think of this discussion now he’s been poached by The Sun as their new deputy editor-in-chief…

Boris acknowledging the link between infections and hospitalisations has been severed thanks to the vaccine rollout. Freedom Day is now almost certain to go ahead: distancing, masks, and bubbles to be scrapped…