Baggy trousers

Still keeping his own counsel, Sir Robbie Gibb may be reflecting at recent events at the BBC. One of his former editors said this week "Machiavellian is a mild description of Robbie's appetite for plotting."

Where did he get this taste for skulduggery ?  Perhaps in 1985, aged 21, when he visited Moscow as an undercover courier. He'd borrowed a pair of baggy khaki trousers from his girlfriend (later wife) Liz, to conceal more than 100 letters to give support and ideas to dissisdents. Cautious ? He even turned the taps on in his hotel bedroom, to conceal sounds of unpacking, before taking them to a range of postboxes around the capital. 

Robbie had been recruited by his brother Nick, who was in turn one of a number of young Conservatives cultivated by the anti-communist National Alliance of Russian Solidarists (NTS) organisation. Nick had been trained by a German handler called 'Alex', in furtive meetings in cafes around Victoria Station, for his trip to Leningrad. 

Nick and Robbie were on the 'libertarian' wing of the Federation of Conservative Students, eventually closed down by Norman Tebbit. Nick Robinson, at the 'wet' end of the Young Conservatives, had spun effectively against the Federation. 

Commenting on his days as a Moscow Mule, Sir Robbie said “In an age of social media, the mass sharing of disinformation breeds division within society. The Soviet dissidents knew the value of truth and the prize of living in a liberal democracy. We should never lose sight of what they fought so hard to achieve.”

If it was Sir Robbie Gibb who pulled the levers that led to the exit of Tim Davie and Deborah Turness, it looks like there were unintended casualties. "Allies" of Sir Robbie have said he supported Tim. The obvious corollary is that he had Ms Turness in his sights.