John Prescott, a pork pie and me – my run-in with Labour’s deputy leader
Brandishing a pork pie on a silver tray, John Prescott stood on the stage during his 1995 Labour conference speech and bellowed: “Lies, lies! Porky pies!”
It was the defining moment of my stormy 40-year relationship with the combustible, irascible former Cunard steward who became Britain’s longest-serving deputy prime minister.
The object of his anger was my front page splash in that day’s Daily Express under the headline: “Prescott fury at new snub. Blair deputy is passed over for radio interview.”
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The story began: “John Prescott was ‘spitting blood’ last night at another humiliating snub by Tony Blair and his inner circle.
“The Labour deputy was said to be furious that Mr Blair’s friend Peter Mandelson will appear in a major end-of-conference BBC interview instead of him.”
The previous evening, with two Daily Express colleagues I’d dined at Brighton’s English’s seafood restaurant with Blair ally Jack Straw, then shadow home secretary.
I’d only filed about half a dozen paragraphs, but the office called and demanded more copy, as they wanted to splash the story. So I phoned another 10 paragraphs from English’s – back when journalists spoke their articles down the phone to a copytaker.
The articles Jon Craig wrote about Mr Prescott
Mr Straw came to me the next day and said people who’d seen us dining thought he was the source. He wasn’t, I reassured him! It was a Labour MP who was a close ally of Mr Prescott.
In his conference speech, Mr Prescott attempted to summon me to the stage to be presented with the pork pie. I resisted the temptation. But he wasn’t finished.
After his speech, with TV crews from Sky News and Newsnight in tow, he came into the press room to remonstrate with me. And he did indeed present me with the pork pie.
Read more:
John Prescott dies aged 86
What has Labour learnt from Prescott
Mr Prescott leaving Hull’s Labour Party office. Pic: Rui Vieira/PA
In the next day’s Daily Express, under the headline “That’s pie in the sky, John”, I wrote: “First let me declare an interest. I am a fan of Labour deputy leader John Prescott.
“Over the years, he has shouted at me, sworn at me and once poked me in the chest in the committee corridor of the Commons.”
Right up to his sad death, I remained a fan. And the last time we met, in the House of Lords when his health was deteriorating, he said to me: “You always tell it like it is, Jon.”
Somewhat startled, I replied: “You didn’t always say that, John!” But clearly the old warhorse had mellowed in old age and was prepared to forgive if not forget.
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Tributes paid to Lord Prescott
Before the 1995 spat, when Mr Prescott was a member of Neil Kinnock’s shadow cabinet, I’d often ring him for a quote for the newspapers I worked for before the Daily Express.
Often driving one of his legendary “two Jags”, he’d begin by berating me and complaining about “your f***ing paper” before eventually saying: “What do you want to know.”
When Bryan Gould resigned from John Smith’s shadow cabinet in 1992 over a left-right policy clash, I asked Mr Prescott if he too was planning to resign.
“Don’t be daft!” he replied bluntly. He may have been outspoken and combative. But he was also a pragmatist, as he was to prove in his 10 years as deputy prime minister.
Mr Prescott with one of his Jags. Pic: Clive Limpkin/Daily Mail/Shutterstock
Our last clash before he mellowed was when he stood unsuccessfully to become police and crime commissioner for Humberside in 2012, which I covered for Sky News.
After his defeat, I asked him – not unreasonably, I thought – if he was going to retire now. “Retire? Retire!” he shouted at me. But he later did, when his health began to fail.
I was heartened when he spoke to me in friendly terms the last time we met. Unlike some senior politicians, he wasn’t one to bear grudges, after all.
And what became of the pork pie? I took it back to the Express office and presented it to a rather bemused Sir Nicholas Lloyd, the editor. We didn’t eat it, though.
The pie, after all, had legendary status. Like John Prescott did.
We’ll never see his like again.
Lawmakers in the US states of Minnesota and Alabama filed companion bills to identical existing bills that if passed into law, would allow each state to buy Bitcoin.
The Minnesota Bitcoin Act, or HF 2946, was introduced to the state’s House by Republican Representative Bernie Perryman on April 1, following an identical bill introduced on March 17 by GOP state Senator Jeremy Miller.
Meanwhile, on the same day in Alabama, Republican state Senator Will Barfoot introduced Senate Bill 283, while a bi-partisan group of representatives led by Republican Mike Shaw filed the identical House Bill 482, which allows for the state to invest in crypto, but essentially limits it to Bitcoin (BTC).
Twin Alabama bills don’t explicitly name Bitcoin
Minnesota’s Bitcoin Act would allow the state’s investment board to invest state assets in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies and permit state employees to add crypto to retirement accounts.
It would also exempt crypto gains from state income taxes and give residents the option to pay state taxes and fees with Bitcoin.
Source: Bitcoin Laws
The twin Alabama bills don’t explicitly identify Bitcoin, but would limit the state’s crypto investment into assets that have a minimum market value of $750 billion, a criterion that only Bitcoin currently meets.
26 Bitcoin reserve bills now introduced in the US
Introducing identical bills is not uncommon in the US and is typically done to speed up the bicameral legislative process so laws can pass more quickly.
Bills to create a Bitcoin reserve have been introduced in 26 US states, with Arizona currently the closest to passing a law to make one, according to data from the bill tracking website Bitcoin Laws.
Arizona currently leads in the US state Bitcoin reserve race. Source: Bitcoin Laws
Pennsylvania was one of the first US states to introduce a Bitcoin reserve bill, in November 2024. However, the initiative was reportedly eventually rejected, with similar bills also killed in Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.
Related: North Carolina bills would add crypto to state’s retirement system
Montana, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, South Dakota and Wyoming are the five states thathave rejected Bitcoin reserve initiatives. Source: Bitcoin Laws
According to a March 3 report by Barron’s, “red states” like Montana have faced setbacks to the Bitcoin reserve initiatives amid political confrontations between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.
Additional reporting by Helen Partz.
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Update (April 3, 5:43 am UTC): This article has been updated to add information on the STABLE Act and GENIUS Act.
The US House Financial Services Committee has passed a Republican-backed stablecoin framework bill, which will now head to the House floor for a full vote.
The Committee passed the Stablecoin Transparency and Accountability for a Better Ledger Economy, or STABLE Act, with a 32-17 vote on April 2, with six Democrats voting in favor.
The bill was introduced on Feb. 6 by committee Chair French Hill and the chair of its Digital Assets Subcommittee, Bryan Steil — reportedly drafted with the help of the world’s largest stablecoin issue, Tether.
Source: Financial Services GOP
The bill would provide rules around payment stablecoins, a crypto token tied to a currency such as the US dollar, and aims to ensure issuers give information about their business and how they back their tokens.
During an earlier markup session, the committee’s leading Democrat, Maxine Waters, who later voted against the bill, criticized her Republican peers for “setting an unacceptable and dangerous precedent” with the STABLE Act.
She said President Donald Trump could use the bill to allow his family’s stablecoin to be used in government payments, and argued the bill validates Trump “and his insiders’ efforts to write rules of the road that will enrich themselves at the expense of everyone else.”
In late March, the Trump family’s World Liberty Financial crypto venture launched a stablecoin, World Liberty Financial USD (USD1). Meanwhile, the US Housing Department, which oversees social housing, was reportedly looking to experiment with using stablecoins for some of its functions.
Stablecoin GENIUS Act also weaves through Congress
Other stablecoin-related bills are also working their way through Congress, including the Republican-led Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for US Stablecoins, or GENIUS Act, which lays out oversight and reserve rules for issuers.
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The US Senate Banking Committee voted through the GENIUS Act in an 18-6 vote on March 13, after Senator Bill Hagerty, one of the bill’s co-sponsors, updated it following consultation with the Committee’s Democrats.
Before the vote, Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said the updated GENIUS Act made “significant improvements to a number of important provisions” in areas such as consumer protections and authorized stablecoin issuers.
Both the STABLE Act and GENIUS Act will now wait until debate time on the floor of the House and Senate, respectively, before they head for a floor vote.
Crypto journalist Eleanor Terrett reported on X that two unnamed crypto lobbyists said there is likely to be “a coordinated push behind the scenes over the next few weeks to get the two bills to mirror each other, as there are still some differences between them.”
Doing so would “avoid having to set up a so-called conference committee which is formed so members from both chambers can negotiate to create a final version of the bill everyone agrees on,” she added.
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Tulip Siddiq has told Sky News her “lawyers are ready” to handle any formal questions about allegations she is involved in corruption in Bangladesh.
Asked whether she regrets apparent links with the Bangladeshi Awami League political party, Ms Siddiq said “why don’t you look at my legal letter and see if I have any questions to answer… [the Bangladeshi authorities] have not once contacted me and I’m waiting to hear from them”.
The London MP resigned as a Treasury minister in January after being named in several corruption inquiries in Bangladesh.
In her first public comments since leaving government, Ms Siddiq said “there’s been allegations for months on end and no one has contacted me”.
Last month, the interim leader of Bangladesh told Sky News the MP had “wealth left behind” in the country “and should be made responsible”.
Lawyers acting for Ms Siddiq wrote to the Bangladeshi Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) several weeks ago saying the allegations were “false and vexatious”.
The letter said the ACC must put questions to Ms Siddiq “by no later than 25 March 2025” or “we shall presume that there are no legitimate questions to answer”.
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Staff from the NCA visited Bangladesh as part of initial work to support the interim government in the country.
In a post online today, the former minister said the deadline had expired and the authorities had not replied.
Sky News has approached the Bangladeshi government for comment.
The allegations against Ms Siddiq are focused on links to her aunt Sheikh Hasina – who served as the prime minister of Bangladesh for 20 years.
Ms Hasina was forced to flee the country in August following weeks of deadly protests.
She is accused of becoming an autocrat, with politically-motivated arrests, extra-judicial killings and other abuses allegedly happening on her watch. Hasina claims it’s all a political witch hunt.
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Ms Siddiq was found to have lived in several London properties that had links back to the Awami League political party that her aunt still leads.
She referred herself to the prime minister’s standards adviser Sir Laurie Magnus who said he had “not identified evidence of improprieties” but added it was “regrettable” Ms Siddiq had not been more alert to the “potential reputational risks” of the ties to her aunt.
Ms Siddiq said continuing in her role would be “a distraction” for the government but insisted she had done nothing wrong.
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