Tongues are wagging about why seven-job George Osborne clears time in his busy diary to meet Tory strategist Lynton Crosby. The London Evening Standard editor’s regular Wednesday appointments with the Lizard of Oz’s CTF outfit surely couldn’t herald an audacious political comeback by a former chancellor plotting the ultimate vengeance against his nemesis, Theresa May? My snout whispered that cops would know where to go if the capital’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, was pushed under a London bus. I’m sure May will be relaxed that her party’s highly paid adviser counsels a deadly rival who’d like her chopped up in bags in his freezer.
Tory high command is newly optimistic that it can rig the next general election by abolishing 50 mainly Labour, Lib Dem and SNP seats to bolster the Conservatives in a 600-seat parliament. The word is that the DUP may be onside after a proposed redrawing of Northern Irish boundaries that would leave May’s Praetorian Guard with 10 seats, with independent unionist Sylvia Hermon sacrificed in a reduction from 18 MPs to 17. The sectarian DUP takes no prisoners.
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