n this uproarious collection, Ann Treneman, the caustic and witty parliamentary sketch-writer for The Times, tells the true, unvarnished story of Britain’s first coalition government since the Second World War. As well as the headline acts – David Cameron and his Flashman alter ego, Nick Clegg’s struggle to stop looking sad, Ed ‘Two Kitchens’ Miliband’s heroic attempts to relaunch himself – she was there to see UKIP shed its fruitcakes, the Speaker be compared to a dwarf, and the Greens go surge-tastic. With an eye for the absurd, an ear always attuned to the jargon junkies of politics, and a nose for what’s really going on underneath the talk, Ann Treneman chronicles the events that everyone in Parliament would much rather forget: the AV referendum; the chaos of the tuition-fee vote; the Omnishambles Budget; the train wreck that was Lords reform; the dramatic Syria vote; and, of course, the panic-stricken campaign over the Scottish Neverendum. Floods, horsemeat, badgers and bile, it’s all here – a tragicomic coalition tale. ‘Gorgeous George’ Osborne may have said ‘we’re all in this together’, but now they really are – in this hilarious book.
