Five great books on leadership, and a line on the NHS reforms
Thanks to those who agreed with some (in one case all) of my choices of five books on Mariella Frostrups’ Open Book programme, which is repeated on Radio 4 at 4pm on Thursday. They were This Sporting...
View ArticlePublic want more variety and less monoprism than media gives them – a...
To remind you of another Rule One of communications – never confuse media opinion with public opinion. And Rule 1a – always expect better, more interesting and more varied questions from the public. If...
View ArticleWhy Max Clifford hates David Cameron, why Wayne Rooney’s callgirl likes me,...
I hope I’m not giving away Nicky Campbell’s trade secrets when I reveal that yesterday’s BBC Big Questions about the existence or otherwise of heaven was recorded live, and next week’s about the press...
View ArticleA welcome addition to the depression campaign library – this time from a top...
A break from politics and the press today, and instead three of my other interests – football, mental illness and plugging books. No, not my own books, though these are available here here here here...
View ArticleRobert Enke’s story is more important than Rio Ferdindand’s
While the press revels in the judgement that allows them to carry on with kiss and tell stories about footballers (provided they are England captain it would seem) I would like to focus not on Rio...
View ArticleIf catflap is best Tories can do, no wonder FT Europe imposes blackout
Greetings from Vienna airport where I am waiting for a plane, worrying about the unseasonal heat, getting irritated by a couple who are kissing their dog like it is a baby, and trying to find a single...
View ArticleGreat time on The Wright Stuff, and why I am renaming my diaries Fifty Shades...
I must admit to being a bit grouchy with Random House publicity for getting me up for another early start in order to spend much of the morning as a panellist on Channel 5′s The Wright Stuff. I am not...
View ArticleMy first ever rebuttal of a sex scene after Fifty Shades of crap Guardian...
Unsurprisingly, Guardian readers have been rubbishing my so-called sex scene in today’s paper, where I was one of several writers asked to try to turn on women with words and so further help fuel the...
View ArticleExcitement mounting amid countdown to seminal life-changing cultural event
The excitement (mine) is mounting … Not quite to the peak of the day I trotted out in front of 72000 people at Old Trafford with Diego Maradona (I never talk about it as regulars know) and three other...
View ArticleSlowly re-emerging from novel-writing hibernation to see a government that is...
It’s flattering I suppose when people notice … that I have not been blogging much. It is becoming a new year tradition, like stomach upsets, broken resolutions, sacked football managers and tiny FA Cup...
View ArticleHave we got the balance right between the ‘war on drugs’ and dealing with...
I am about to do some interviews about my new novel, My Name Is …, out next week, which tells the story of a young girl’s descent into alcoholism. It is a novel, a story, but I hope one that makes...
View ArticleMore rebuttal on book interview headlines – and reminder to Labour re ‘mess...
Another day, another perfectly fair, accurately quoted interview, this time in the Daily Telegraph, with Celia Walden. There are various reasons why I said ‘yes’ when she asked to do the piece. First,...
View ArticleCameron, Clegg and Miliband should listen to police and doctors re costs of...
I was going to spend part of today’s sickbed sojourn writing a blog about the Lib Dem conference, but Chief Constable Adrian Lee’s remarks that Britain needs to take a long hard look at its drinking...
View ArticleMemo to Labour – energy, fight, future policy, stand up for Labour record,...
Having been in hospital from Monday to Thursday I watched more TV news than usual this week, and spotted a trend, one which is useful to Labour as the party conference begins. It is that the Tory...
View ArticleMy anger at McBride is not his gift to the Tories now, but the one he and...
I really like Iain Dale, and believe the Tories missed a trick when he tried and failed to become an MP for them. He would have been a good MP, and perhaps a good minister. But he has fulfilled an...
View ArticleOne terrific speech does not change the weather overnight – the whole Party...
Barack Obama’s strategist David Axelrod once said that political conventional wisdom is almost always wrong and we have had a good example of that in Britain recently. Over the summer the conventional...
View ArticleOn women and booze, and why more and more women are getting more and more...
When I made a documentary on alcoholism for the BBC a couple of years ago, one of the first people to get in touch was Lucy Rocca who, together with a friend, had set up an online self-help group for...
View ArticleIt’s my book and I’ll plug if I want to (…at least until the alcohol crisis...
We were up in Scotland for Christmas, internet connection suitably weak, cycling conditions wet but beautiful, mental health conditions the usual end of old year/start of new up and down, so I laid off...
View ArticlePolitics has so much to learn from business and sport in the art of winning
It is always a nice moment when the publisher sends through the final, final version of the cover of a planned new book. It is especially nice when the designer has taken an idea given by the author –...
View ArticleSlowly re-emerging from novel-writing hibernation to see a government that is...
It’s flattering I suppose when people notice … that I have not been blogging much. It is becoming a new year tradition, like stomach upsets, broken resolutions, sacked football managers and tiny FA Cup...
View Article
