I’M used to singing for my supper.
Selling not so much.
When Martin Jenkins, the chairman of the Maggie’s Yorkshire charity, invited me to a dinner to celebrate the fifth anniversary of the opening of the centre which supports people with cancer and their families, I was delighted to accept.
I spent several years on the board of the charity helping to raise the money to build and open the magnificent centre on a site at the heart of St James’s Hospital in Leeds.
As well as helping to provide care, encouragement and support for those with cancer, the centre is an architectural gem, designed by the celebrated Thomas Heatherwick.
The event to celebrate five years since it opened was held on the mezzanine level of the JCT600 Ferrari dealership in Leeds.
It is a huge building and over 100 guests sat down for dinner surrounded by gleaming Ferraris.
The fact that the event was held just a couple of hundred yards from Elland Road on the night that Leeds United took on Norwich in the second leg of the Championship play-off semi-final made getting there a little bit of a challenge.
To be honest, it made me relieved I didn’t have to steer a Ferrari through the traffic to get there.
A Raleigh Grifter is much more nimble.
And when you leave it propped up against a Ferrari Monza SP1, nobody nicks it.
An early goal by Leeds and a final score of four-nil, announced by compere, TV presenter Christine Talbot, brought cheers from the audience.
Entertainment at the Maggie’s dinner was not as high-octane as at Elland Road, but equally enjoyable.
Concert pianist Min-Jung Kym had flown in from Paris to play at the event.
She has had cancer and explained how music inspired her recovery, writing a book called ‘Music to Help Overcome Cancer’ and recording an album, ‘Sounds for the Soul’.
My role on the evening was as auctioneer.
It is not a job I particularly relish because I want to make sure the charity gets as much money as possible from an auction – so the pressure is on.
But I love Maggie’s and Martin is very persuasive…
I explained to the audience that I’m not a professional auctioneer.
Well, I’m not a professional anything.
There were only four lots but they were all really high quality.
Two donated by Ferrari Leeds were VIP hospitality packages to the Ferrari Challenge UK at Silverstone and the Goodwood Festival of Speed.
Then there were two tickets with full hospitality on board the Northern Belle, the luxury steam train, donated by chef Nigel Smith, who cooked dinner at the event.
The beautifully cooked meal of scallops and asparagus, followed by lamb with a herb crust, was superb.
The fourth auction lot was dinner, bed and breakfast at luxury Yorkshire hotel Grantley Hall.
The bidding was lively and we got to a point where a man and woman on the same table were bidding against each other.
From what I gather, they didn’t know each other but eventually decided to buy it between them and go together.
Who needs Bumble when you can go to a charity auction?
I felt like cupid in a suit.
When I got up to start the auction, I explained to the audience that when Martin had asked me to do the auction, I’d inquired who else would be speaking at the event.
“It’s the TV presenter Christine Talbot and you: beauty and the beast.”
Which I thought was a little bit harsh on Christine.
WHO the hell told Rishi Sunak that it would be a good idea to announce an election in a downpour in Downing Street?
AS the Prime Minister attempted to list the positives from his 18 months in office his suit was transformed into a wetsuit.
Plenty of media commentators other than me have already had their say on the “election optics” in Downing Street.
If you are going to go to the country and announce it outside in May, then there is a damn good chance that the weather might not be great.
To be honest, this is Britain: it could be chucking it down on any day of the year.
Apparently the Prime Minister delayed the announcement to avoid the heaviest downpours of the day.
But as soon as the door of Number 10 opened, the heavens did too.
Now, of course, Rishi and his handlers wanted to avoid a Steve McClaren moment.
Do you remember when the then England football manager stood on the touchline watching his team lose to Croatia and so fail to qualify for Euro 2008 clutching an umbrella in one hand and a cup of coffee in a paper cup in the other?
The Press focused on the inanimate object in his right hand and the Daily Mail headline the next morning read: ‘A wally with a brolly’.
So I can see why Rishi’s communications team didn’t want to send him out carrying an umbrella – even though all the journalists gathered outside in Downing Street were huddled under brollies.
But surely they could have sorted out some sort of canopy to put up over the lectern?
Argos sells garden gazebos in a variety of colours.
My friend Steve has one ready to erect just in case, every time he has a barbecue.
You could buy one for as little as 90 quid from Argos and if you use the code GARDEN25 then you’ll currently get 25% off.
And there was one available to pick up from Sainsbury’s in Pimlico – just a short walk from Downing Street.
Not only was the weather against Rishi Sunak but there was also a cacophony of noise and music from protesters at the gates of Downing Street.
The drenched PM battled the elements and protesters who turned up the volume on their sound system to play D:Ream’s Things Can Only Get Better, Tony Blair’s election anthem back in 1997.
We live in a democracy where non-violent protests are rightly legal.
There must be a demonstration or march for one cause or another on the streets of London every week.
Now I’m as cynical about our prime ministers and politicians as the next person, but they have the right to speak, like everyone else.
The blaring background noise to every prime ministerial announcement outside number 10 in the last five years has been to a soundtrack of noise from anti-Brexit protesters.
Perhaps if we hadn’t had so many premiers, I’d not have noticed the noise so much.
But for every resignation speech, I remember the background noise.
There was Liz Truss’s emotionless resignation speech.
Boris Johnson’s “Them’s the breaks,” self-pitying resignation speech
Theresa May’s attempt at British stiff upper lip, before it cracked and she shed tears at the end
And David Cameron’s exit speech the morning after the Brexit vote and just before he headed off to his shepherd’s hut and a clutch of lucrative consultancy roles.
What surprised me is that all this noise was caused by people protesting against the UK leaving the European Union.
That vote took place almost eight years ago.
Don’t these people have jobs or lives to get on with?
You wonder if they had focused their energy on a job, building a business or volunteering in the community they might have achieved a little more than they have since 2016.
Of course, we live in a democracy and they have the right to protest about what they choose to.
But it is precisely because we live in a democracy that Brexit took place.
Like it or not a majority of people who voted in the 2016 referendum on Britain’s place in the European Union decided to leave.
The vote was 51.9% leave to 48.1% remain.
Yes, close but still a majority in favour of the UK’s exit from the EU.
Democracy in action.
Despite there being five prime ministers since that historic vote, there has yet to be one, in my humble opinion, who has been able to manifest the benefits of Brexit.
That’s one for the in-tray of the next resident of Number 10 Downing Street.
WHEN I popped into Leeds one afternoon earlier this week I had an unusual experience.
There were no problems with the traffic and it was really cheap to park the car.
Don’t be daft, that’s just a recurring dream I have every night.
What I actually saw were middle aged men wearing brown shoes, jeans or chinos and bodywarmers wandering around the city centre looking confused or sitting outside bars looking slightly less confused.
Ah, I thought, it must be UKREiiF.
The property industry converged on Leeds this week for a conference catchily named the UK’s Real Estate Investment and Infrastructure Forum.
It’s like Invasion of the Body Snatchers in gilets.
The event certainly meant the city’s hotels, restaurants, cafes and bars were full for a few days.
And other than inconveniencing eminent lawyer Rodney Dalton, who was unable to get his regular table in Sous le Nez and the Dakota Hotel, appears to have been received well.
As I wandered through Leeds city centre amidst a Gobi Desert of casual wear, I spotted the sartorial equivalent of an oasis: James Michelsberg.
The celebrated tailor and boulevardier was strolling along Albion Place in a navy double breasted suit, extreme cutaway collar white shirt, one of his late father’s brightly patterned ties, a pair of highly polished black Oxford shoes and a fedora hat.
He greeted me with his usual exuberance and for me, like a drowning man in a sea of uninspiring attire, it was like grabbing onto a rakish raft.
Have a great weekend.