ES News email The latest headlines in your inbox twice a day Monday - Friday plus breaking news updates Enter your email address Continue Please enter an email address Email address is invalid Fill out this field Email address is invalid You already have an account. Please log in Register with your social account or click here to log in I would like to receive lunchtime headlines Monday - Friday plus breaking news alerts, by email Update newsletter preferences

Last month Zac Goldsmith used the pages of The Spectator to attack Ed Balls, who was claiming credit for keeping Britain out of the euro. Goldsmith said it was his father, James, who should get the gold star for it. But now former Prime Minister Sir John Major writes back in the Speccy to say Zac is talking poppycock.

“Much as I admire filial loyalty, I cannot allow Zac Goldsmith’s article about his father to go uncorrected,” Major says in his letter. “Sir James Goldsmith was a formidable campaigner against the European Union and the euro currency but at no point did he alter government policy. Zac Goldsmith suggests that I did not offer a referendum on membership of the euro currency out of conviction. This is wrong ...If anything, Sir James made the decision process more difficult, since no one in Cabinet wished to appear to be influenced.” Meow.

In his original letter, Zac had written: “Sorry, Ed Balls. Keeping Britain out of the euro calamity is my father’s legacy, not yours,” saying Goldsmith Snr’s Referendum Party in the Nineties “unleashed a chain of events that led inexorably and inevitably to a public veto on joining the single currency.”

Major’s tenure as PM from 1990 to 1997 was riven with arguments over Europe but he isn’t going to let a Goldsmith have the last word. “I do not wish to re-open old sores,” he ends, “nor do I wish to cause any offence to the Goldsmith family. But for the sake of historical record, I cannot allow such myths to take root.” We’re sure no offence is taken, though Zac Goldsmith may be sharpening his quill.

Busman's holiday for Nairne

Sandy Nairne, until recently director at the National Portrait Gallery — now replaced by the guinea-pig loving Nicholas Cullinan — is having a busman’s holiday. Nairne will be playing the tour guide for an Art Fund expedition to Denmark, with visits to Frederiksborg Castle, near Copenhagen, the country’s National Portrait Gallery and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. Nairne’s expertise doesn’t come cheap, though — the trip costs £2,270 per person for three days.

Clegg can vape, but biscuits are out

Third time lucky? After proudly announcing in 2011 that he was going to stop smoking, then sheepishly saying in 2013 that this time he would really give up, Nick Clegg has apparently finally kicked the habit. He spoke on LBC radio this morning about how he hasn’t smoked in weeks. His secret? Vaping. The Deputy Prime Minister has been using electronic cigarettes for “about a month and a half”, which is good timing.

On February 2, parliamentary rules were changed to allow staff to vape in parts of the Palace of Westminster, after lobbying from MPs and researchers. But given that Clegg has also recently been banned from eating biscuits by his aides, we really do wish him the best of luck.

Shop while you sip

Shopping in Mayfair can be a stark affair, with stores like Victoria Beckham’s defined by minimalism. So it’s good to hear of Alice Temperley relaunching her Notting Hill boutique store in Colville Mews, where shoppers can pop in for a cuppa. “I don’t want sterile,” she told us at the party there last night, attended by model Arizona Muse.

“I want people to have a chat. A homely experience.” And buy clothes? “Yes,” she giggled, “that too.” Budget-wise we’re more suited to teabags than handbags.

Politicos in uniform? Suits you, sir

It wasn’t just a Budget statement that George Osborne was making yesterday; it was also a fashion statement. The Chancellor rocked up to the dispatch box in trousers just above the ankle, signalling a man in tune with East End hipster chic. But others in the Treasury pack, though, including Lib-Dem Danny Alexander in a tight-fitting suit, didn’t quite cut it.

For sartorial guidance on Budget dressing The Londoner turned to fashion designer and The Great British Sewing Bee star Patrick Grant, pictured: “Savile Row is on [Westminster’s] doorstep and makes the best-fitting suits in the world, all made by hand by British craftsmen — but were one of our politicians to wear one they’d be pilloried for being posh rather than being praised for supporting British manufacturing.

“I’d much rather they spent their time dealing with important things — such as creating more jobs for British craftsmen — than worrying about their clobber.”

His solution? “Make them all wear a three-piece charcoal wool suit, in British cloth made in a British factory, simple but robust, demob style, and a British-made shirt and tie every day so they never had to waste a second thinking about what they wore, or worrying about being lampooned by the press.

“Worked fine for the Victorians and Edwardians.”

What's next for Armando?

Armando Iannucci, writer and creator of political satire The Thick of It, was at the BFI last night for the Screen Epiphanies series. Before taking his seat, Iannucci explained that he is currently editing the fourth series of his American hit show Veep but what’s next? “I’m planning a film about the death of Stalin,” he said. “It’s a comedy.”

Elba dashes Bond hopes

Bad news for fans of Idris Elba, pictured. The actor has long been tipped to step into James Bond’s tuxedo when the time comes for Daniel Craig to hand in his licence to kill. He had previously encouraged the speculation and even had backing from former 007 Pierce Brosnan. But now he has dashed our hopes and said that he’s not interested.

“Nah, I’m too old now,” he tells this month’s BA High Life magazine. “It’s nice to be described as a classy British brand but, you know, it’s just a massive rumour. I think I’ve probably put the Bond team off even thinking about me now ‘cause I’ve talked so much about it.”

The New Statesman’s seriously intellectual deputy editor Helen Lewis will be pleased: she’s gunning for Chiwetel Ejiofor.

Bet of the day: from Stanley Johnson, who has put £20 at 5-1 on his son Boris becoming PM after David Cameron. Just £20? Not the greatest vote of confidence.