Jacqui ‘I’m a disgrace and shouldn’t be a peer’ Smith was given a peerage over the weekend to serve as education minister in Starmer’s “change” government. Co-conspirators will remember that Smith was the first to fall to expensegate in 2009 – taxpayers paid for her husband’s porno thrills and almost everything else, literally including the kitchen sink, right down to her 88p bath plug. She resigned and declared in 2012 on Question Time: “I don’t think people who have been disgraced should go to the House of Lords”…

It’s worth remembering what the former Home Secretary said last time an ex-politician with experience of government entered the Lords to work again. Literally nine months ago on the For The Many podcast she said:

“It is a bit of a sign that you’re coming to the end of a government… it’s not undoable, where I think it matters more and it mattered when Peter Mandelson came back is – it slightly suggests that you don’t think there are any of your own backbenchers who are able to do it and there might be a few people that are a bit peeved about it… it is also done, as the Peter Mandelson thing was done, as an attempt to try to limit a potential defeat that is coming down the track…”

Starmer will be surprised to hear his government is coming to an end…

Here is former Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, chairwoman of The Jo Cox Foundation, appearing on Politics Live today ahead of the launch of her own foundation’s Civility Commission. Surely the day to lead by example…

Not so much. Instead, Smith told her fellow panellist Isabel Oakeshott to “shut up” in a row over Brexit, with Jo Coburn herself forced to return some civility to the debate, adding: “Let’s not descend into insults.” Eventually, Smith apologised:

I apologised to Isabel because I was wrong to say shut up.

— Jacqui Smith (@Jacqui_Smith1) February 28, 2023

“I was wrong to say shut up…” Jacqui finally apologised.

As major cities like Birmingham ramp-up to avoid a second wave of Covid, it’s all hands on deck for those at the top of the health profession; all except one, however: the chair of Birmingham’s University Hospitals, Jacqui Smith, who has taken unpaid leave from October 1st to appear on the show, bouncing her deputy in to take over her duties while she tangos away. Smith made headlines in 2016 after it was revealed she’s taking home £50,000 a year for just two days work a week…

While Harriet Baldwin MP Tweeted “So glamorous- good luck and enjoy!” Birmingham Tory MP Gary Sambrook made clear to Guido he’s less than impressed:

“It’s astonishing timing really. I’m sure if Jacqui was a former Tory Home Secretary many Labour MPs and Councillors would be calling for her resignation. I wish her all the luck anyone would need to learn the salsa but just ask that she remains very mindful of the important work that needs doing outside of the TV studio back home.” 

To give the BBC some credit, their styling department has done an impressive job…