Philippa Mingins

FROM Sir Philip Green being exposed as the British Harvey Weinstein and the cheeky Ladybird guide to Brexit, to the coat for those who'd rather wear a dressing gown, welcome to This Reporter's daily news and style round-up.

Only one person fell off their chair at the news Topshop magnate Sir Philip Green was the top businessman who silenced the world about his sexual abuse transgressions. And this was the first time that one person had sat on a chair, after crawling out from under the rock they had been living under, so it was really all round quite unfortunate.

But This Reporter insists let us not allow our overall lack of surprise distract us from what a baddie Sir Philip is, for forking out a ton of cash on an injunction linked to allegations known as the "British #MeToo scandal". And many thanks to Labour peer Peter Hain for using an ancient parliamentary right in the House of Lords to expose him.

Of course it is correct when dealing with these matters to offer r…

FROM the suspected bombs sent out to Trump's critics and Ross from Friends in the frame with Blackpool police, to the resurgence of picket line favourite - the Dr Marten boot, welcome to This Reporter's daily news and style round-up.

In the words of many a newspaper columnist, "the rhetoric became real" yesterday (Wednesday) as it emerged suspected explosives had been sent to a host of prominent Donald Trump critics including former President Barack Obama and Democrat presidential nominee Hilary Clinton. The "bombs" were intercepted by the US Secret Service. On the same day the CNN studios in New York were evacuated after a "live explosive device" was found in its mail room.

New York police commissioner James O-Neill said the targets may have been selected due to their opposition to Trump. And Trump's constant rhetoric of violence towards his opponents - including most recently praising the "slam-dunking" of a Guardian journalist - i…

FROM urgent calls for patients to stockpile their own medicine and Legoland renamed "Deep Fried Crap Land", to the tech worker's wardrobe essential - the fleece, welcome to This Reporter's daily news and style round-up.

Patients are being urged to start stockpiling their own drugs as soon as it looks likely the UK will leave the EU with no deal. This is the message from the pharmaceutical industry as they warn MPs a no deal Brexit will be "catastrophic" for medicine supplies.

Pharmaceutical bods elaborated, government contingency plans for suppliers to stockpile several weeks of drugs were insufficient and there were no facilities at ports to store drugs at low temperatures in event of delays. They pleaded the next phase of plans should be put in place. Meanwhile This Reporter urges immediate raids of pharmacies. Just don't say who sent you.

It's fair to say Donald Trump has never had the riches of the English language at his fingertips but the Pres…

FROM Khashoggi's body double and plastic bottle currency, to the return of the super-sized tote bag, welcome to This Reporter's daily news and style round-up.

CCTV footage has "suddenly" emerged of what appears to be a body double dressed up in murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi's clothes. It is believed the doppelganger donned Khashoggi's clothes and a fake beard and intentionally made sure he was captured on CCTV in a bid to pretend Khashoggi was still alive. The rookie error came where it can be clearly seen the Saudi agent kept his own trainers on.

Meanwhile Turkish President Recep Tayyio Erdogan has expressed his determination to get to the bottom of what happened to Khashoggi after he entered the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, by addressing Parliament with a speech compiling all the leaks, evidence and speculation on the case so far in order to expose the "naked truth" of the Saudi Government's involvement.

Threats of violence against Prime…

FROM the hundreds of thousands at the People's Vote march and Nick Clegg's holographic flit to Facebook, to the magic eye, polka dot trousers, welcome to This Reporter's daily news and style round-up.

The largest demonstration since the protest against the Iraq war, saw just shy of 700,000 people descend onto the streets of London at the weekend to call for a People's Vote on Brexit. The amount of protesters exceeded all expectations, as MPs, celebrities and 'normal folk' banded together to appeal to the government to hold a second referendum on leaving the European Union. To get us out of - in the words of legendary TV cook Delia Smith - this "unmitigated chaos".

Prime Minister Theresa May apparently "oblivious" to this huge groundswell of anti-Brexit feeling, has made the unprecedented move today (Monday) to announce she will address Parliament later to declare Brexit is "95 per cent" completed. This comes as rumours yet again sw…

FROM the culinary delights of chlorinated chicken and a blow to Kleenex Mansize, to that gut-wrenchingly spectacular "Killing Eve" dress, welcome to This Reporter's daily news and style round-up.

In rare glad tidings on the Brexit front, we are being informed the US Government has officially agreed to begin trade talks with Britain "as soon as it is ready" after leaving the EU. But before we do a collective back flip in celebration, doom-mongers - or perhaps just those of sensitive stomach - are reminding us that whilst this trade deal could be worth £180billion, it will come at the price of allowing the flood gates to open on chlorinated chicken - and ultimately a huge decline in food standards in Britain.

Other culinary delights to look forward to from America are hormone-treated beef and pork laced with drugs. All together now - "yummy".

The Tory party has received a proper verbal pasting, from within its own ranks. Johnny Mercer Conservative MP fo…

FROM Theresa May's call for "Brextra Time" and Danny Dyer's Elizabethan Ruff, to the boots to be seen walking in this season, welcome to This Reporter's daily news and style round-up.

"Brextra time" newspaper headlines declare. And you will see what they did there in a minute as This Reporter enlightens you on how Prime Minister Theresa May went "out out" last night (Wednesday) to one of the big events on any Brexit follower's calender, the October EU Summit. Where she addressed all 27 EU leaders on where Britain "was at" on Brexit, ahead of a slap-up dinner, to which Mrs May was not invited.

She was left instead to eat suet with the servants, before pleading for more time on Brexit, by extending the transition period once we exit, from two years to three. Inevitably giving Mrs May and her Cabinet an extra 12 months to faff around and decide on nothing, whilst racking up an even greater EU bill and neglecting more pressing matter…

FROM the EU's call for creative Brexit thinking and Piers Morgan's "emasculating" papoose gripe, to that much talked about Fendi scarf, welcome to This Reporter's daily news and style round-up.

In the latest 'stating the blindingly obvious' study, research group Hope Not Hate found attitudes towards immigration are directly linked to socio-economic deprivation. The pervading view, extracted from the six-year-long project, was many people in deprived communities felt they had been "abandoned and left to rot" by the political establishment in preference to addressing the needs and wishes of new arrivals.

In quite frankly staggering news, Prime Minister Theresa May has, apparently, managed to get her Cabinet to agree to a united front on Brexit ahead of a key summit with the European Union. Details are sketchy, but what permeated strongly from the meeting room on Tuesday afternoon was the smell of frying bacon, as it was revealed Cabinet members we…

AS THIS Reporter has long suspected, all the world's ills can be traced back to Coca Cola. (Other fizzy drinks are available but none so potent.) Not just rotting to the teeth, but rotting to the mind, a vending machine in New Zealand has finally spelt it out in black and white.

"Kia Ora Mate" or "Hello Death", the slogan reads. The media, upon being copiously bribed, has run the story this is a 'lost in translation' moment. A bid to combine the Maori language with English falling flat (mate meaning death in Maori being the stumbler). But This Reporter states, this is a panicked cover-up. The vending machine speaks the unpalatable truth.

Just look at Coca Cola's poster boy, Donald Trump, spouting about climate change this week. Finally climbing down from his preposterous stance that climate change was a hoax devised by China, the American President was still unable to approach the subject with any semblance of rationality. Declaring there was no poi…

WHAT a difference a wedding makes. It was only a few, sweltering, months ago we had our collective spirits lifted by the nuptials between Prince Harry and Meghan. But it appears this short course of time has not been favourable to the mood around royal weddings, taking it from "Hurrah, let's shed a tear", to "We're having none of it".

With the words of that great love story between a man of excess and his wallet lilting in the air, Princess Eugenie, younger daughter of Fergie and Prince Andrew, married her tequila ambassador boyfriend, Jack Brooksbank, on Friday.

The wedding, between Eugenie and the Bottle, was not the low key affair expected of the ninth in line to the throne however, with some 850 guests packing out St George's Chapel. Because as her dad Andrew said, the couple simply have so many "close friends". (Nothing to do with the promise of tequila.)

Those "close friends" were treated to such delights as a reading by Prince…

THIS Reporter notes this is the week for pop stars to tuck their sequined gowns into their knickers and clamber over the divide into the contentious world of politics.

First American pop star Taylor Swift "broke her long-held political silence" - to quote the newspapers - by urging her fans to vote Democrat in the mid-term elections (and as a by-product Donald Trump declared he liked Swift's music 25 per cent less - he prefers Kanye West). And now British pop singer Paloma Faith has hit out at the widespread mockery of Theresa May's dance moves, saying the Prime Minister is unfairly criticised because of her gender.

She elaborates: "Why shouldn't Theresa May dance? I felt bad for her. I'm worried about her policies but I'm not worried about her dancing." Paloma continued it was indicative of how women in the public eye were treated more harshly than men, citing when Tony Blair revealed he was in a rock band, everyone thought he was cool.

This Re…

WE'RE winging it over to the Emerald Isle today where tensions are fraught over the Irish border as the final EU-UK face-off about Brexit begins.

After months of Prime Minister Theresa May bemoaning the ball is in the EU's court, Michel Barnier has made a move, declaring a deal could be struck as soon as next Wednesday. As long as the UK agrees to his terms on how to prevent a hard border down the centre of Ireland, by either the whole of the UK remaining in the customs union or alternatively, Northern Ireland agreeing to remain in it alone.

Arlene Foster of DUP fame has kicked off, declaring her party won't vote in favour of the Government's upcoming Budget if Mrs May agrees to anything which would rip Northern Ireland away from the rest of the UK - they are the Unionist party after all.

But this is all a bit of a stab between the shoulder blades for Mrs May, who thought she was the one wielding around the bribery in this relationship, after giving them £1 billion fro…

THERE will be riots on the streets if the Government continues to roll out its controversial Universal Credit benefits system. That is the warning from former Prime Minister Gordon Brown who predicts a return to poll tax-style chaos and a summer of discontent if Theresa May does not call a halt to the scheme.

The Universal Credit system combines six benefits in one and is set for a full national roll out next year, despite countless reports of claimants already on it being plunged into dire financial straits as a result.

Mr Brown said: "Surely the greatest burning injustice of all is children having to go to school ill-clad and hungry. It is the poverty of the innocent - of children too young to know they are not to blame". This Reporter comments, it really must be a sign of the times, that Gordon Brown returning as Prime Minister seems a welcome idea.

Moving on and President of America, Donald Trump has declared his daughter Ivanka would be "dynamite" as the next …

MAKING the headlines today is the news Turkish authorities are scouring motorway CCTV footage as suspicions continue to rise that dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi was murdered at Istanbul's Saudi consulate and his body smuggled out in a van.

Mr Khashoggi, a US-based critic of the Saudi leadership, went to the consulate to finalise his divorce and did not come back out. A convoy of six cars was seen leaving the consulate two hours later and boxes were caught on security footage being loaded into the back of a black van. Saudi authorities have denied any wrongdoing.

American President Donald Trump meanwhile said there were some pretty bad stories circulating about Khashoggi's fate but hopefully it would "sort itself out". He may as well have said that's one less to deal with.

The annual call has gone out to purchase a puffer jacket - and this year they must be heavily adorned and patterned. The puffer jacket, muses This Reporter, is much the fashion anomaly, in…

TOP science bods have revealed the world is hotting up to such an extent, that if we don't take collective action to tackle it, we are escalating towards it no longer being able to support human life.

That was the stark message from the UN's landmark report, which stated if global warming exceeded the current maximum of 1.5C by just half a degree, it would significantly worsen the risk of drought, flood and extreme heat and poverty for hundreds of millions of people.

But the trouble is, muses This Reporter, climate change is much like western culture's all but near disposal of religion. If it is not as tangible as the iPhone in their hand, they are simply not interested.

Evidence points to buses being the transport of choice for any Brexit-based argument and the tale of a stellar line-up of celebrities stumping up the cash for a cavalcade of coaches to descend upon London for the People's Vote protest, proves the rule rather than the exception.

The buses, monied by the…

TODAY'S fashion pick is the Bambi mini dress by Rixo London. An unashamed nod to the 1980s with its puffed sleeves and sequin embellishment. And there's no better time than now to enjoy a bit of escapist vintage, even from a decade blighted by Thatcher.

But nothing a bit of glossing over swathes of history won't fix. Wasn't it great she was the first female Prime Minister? In the same way we'll say of Theresa May in a few decades time - if the world makes it - didn't she show a great strength for just hanging on?
Back to the dress, and This Reporter's only concern is over the name "Bambi". For starters, due to the devastating plot twist in the Disney portrayal, This Reporter has some concerns over the origin of the velvet. But what other message is the designer trying to convey? 
That the wearer will become splay-legged and unable to navigate this life's metaphorical ice rink or that she will merely have a penchant for befriending small rabbit…

THIS Reporter would firstly like to point out she urged Prime Minister Theresa May to wear a metallic outfit for her keynote conference speech yesterday (Wednesday). She even went to the effort of ripping the page out of Vogue magazine which stated metallics were "fashion protection from the state of the world" -  protection from the likes of Mrs May potentially, but this really isn't the time to quibble - and got it sent over tout suite by carrier pigeon to Birmingham.

Still Mrs May went with the black trouser suit. Readers if you have any sense, purchase the Balmain metallic high-rise straight leg jeans immediately. We're going to need them as we continue.

Of course, there has been much build up to this speech, following on as it does not only from Boris Johnson's leadership audition on Tuesday but also there being so much for Mrs May to rectify after last year's disaster. The hacking cough, the prankster waving the P45, the letters falling from the backdro…

IT'S not clear exactly which part of Boris Johnson's "How to Winston Churchill Yourself to Victory" self-help tape advised him the best path to success was through a wheat field, but This Reporter's been convinced the ribbon got stuck in the tape deck on that one some time ago anyway.

Regardless of the - dubious - motivation, the image of Mr Johnson jogging through what initially appears to be a field of wheat - but on closer inspection is actually dried grass - in mockery of Prime Minister Theresa May's now infamous comment the naughtiest thing she has ever done was run through a farmer's wheat field, has seen him plastered across the front page of many a newspaper and thus has turned the attention away from anything "serious" going on at the Tory conference.

So that's an air punch for Mr Johnson, or aeroplane arms, as it turned out. It was also noted, quite swiftly, that Mr Johnson "happened" to be wearing a very expensive pair o…

THE DRAPE skirt is enjoying a boon of interest thanks to its inclusivity. Guardian Fashion has ordained it fit for all sizes and ages - hurrah. But hold fire on letting off the party poppers just yet. As in manner of research, This Reporter thought it expedient to look up the definition of "drape skirt" online, in a bid to encapsulate what we are talking about in one handy sentence.

And she found herself stumbling across the oracle which could become vocabulary.com that reliably informed her the verb "to drape" means "to cover loosely" as when you, and This Reporter quotes verbatim: "drape a quilt over your old sofa to hide the rips and the stains". Such a marvellous confidence booster.

On the plus side, in the 1940s and 50s, "drape" was apparently, again according to our new friends at vocabulary.com, also a slang term for "a cool suit of clothes". Take from that what you will, as you mull over the merits of purchasing this …

THE MERE mention of wearing chains - even in a fashion sense - should have the alarm bells going off, if we are indeed as far down the road of female emancipation as we hoped, muses This Reporter.

As it goes, Vogue magazine seemed oblivious it was blowing apart our carefully cultivated, 2018 social awareness barometer, with its full page spread on the latest trend to hit the bag world - that of the chain-link shoulder strap.

From hefty bike lock chains, which require more than a generous squeeze of the bolt cutters, and fancy rhinestone bedecked ones, to three strap chains for a good old tethering, we are being asked to hoist them over our shoulders in the name of style, without any concern for feminism.

This Reporter found this Alexander Wang number thrust under her nose, whilst she was doing the washing up. Wonders will never cease how the PC brigade are not onto this.

Elsewhere, Kavanagh, not (ironically) the QC one or indeed the "I Can Make You Feel Good" one of singing …