Paul Staines’ poisonous pen has made him one of the most influential men in Britain, but don’t worry if you don’t recognise the name. Known by his alias Guido Fawkes, Staines is currently preparing for an appearance at this year’s Electric Picnic. Celina Murphy speaks to the man behind the UK’s most sensational political blog.
"I didn’t go to Westminster to make friends,” Paul Staines admits, “and I certainly achieved that objective!”
He loves nothing more than to engineer the spectacular downfall of a blundering, crooked politician, so I’ve got just one question for this razor-tongued blogger – any chance he’ll move back to Ireland?
A great booming laugh tells me I’ll have to find myself another menacing conspiracy-peddler.
44-year-old Staines was born in London, but says that, despite his roots, he doesn’t have the know-how to cover Irish politics on his blog.
“It’s hard when you haven’t grown up in that environment, and you don’t know the ins and outs and all the nuances. The people who are in cabinet in the UK now, I know from my teens. I wouldn’t be that well informed about Ireland. I was a member of the PDs a few years back but that obviously doomed them! But I voted in the Nice referendum and I’m on the electoral roll in Wexford.”
There’s little hope of an Irish site appearing in Guido’s likeness, either, Staines reckons.
“The market isn’t big enough to support it financially, that is the key problem. Part of the reason why we’re so successful is because we don’t have to worry about getting into trouble with our newspaper or upsetting people. If you are a freelance journalist running a blog in Ireland, you have to worry about taking the piss out of the editor of the Indo or the Irish Times. I’d love to do Irish politics, but I’m probably more likely to do Indian politics! It’s a bigger market!”
The fiery Mr. Staines will be returning to Irish shores before
long, though, to take part in a talk in the Leviathan tent at this year’s Electric Picnic.
“I’m looking forward to seeing the Chemical Brothers!” he tells me. “My wife always says that my musical taste stopped in about 1999! Pulp are playing? Public Enemy? Fuck me! Of course, now we’ve got kids and everything, I’m a lot more clean living.”
Since Staines’ true identity was revealed in a BBC Radio 4 documentary in 2007, it’s been well reported that he spent part of his youth working as a promoter with the Sunrise collective, a group that organised raves and acid parties in the early ‘90s.
“It features big on my CV even though it was only 18 months of my life!” he laughs.
So no blow-out drug binges scheduled for the Picnic, then?
“Listen, I’ve got two kids, six and four, and my wife does not approve of any of that stuff. I think those days are behind me.”
The discussion, titled All The News That’s Fit To Print?: Media Ethics And Politics will pitch Staines against an as-yet-unannounced senior News International figure.
“Obviously I’ll be having a bit of fun mocking The Guardian for covering phone hacking,” he hints. “When The Guardian does it, it’s in the public interest, but when The News Of The World do it, it’s a crime. I’ve got quite a lot to say on that one!”
While order-order.com is famous for exposing the seedy underbelly of political life, Staines is equally critical of Britain’s political media and – surprise, surprise – he’s no more enthusiastic about Irish news outlets.
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“RTÉ has been craven for years to whoever is in office. Don’t tell me that isn’t the most stuck up news channel in the world! Then the Irish Times was madly pro-Europe until there was this dawning of awakening. They had this moment of realisation in late 2008 that Ireland had been fucked by the euro completely and the whole paper changed all of a sudden. You couldn’t get a Eurosceptic view in the Irish press, there was nowhere, and then all of a sudden everyone realised it fucked us completely! The Irish media’s attitude to Europe before the crisis, it was just idealised! Completely and utterly unreal! All of that stuff about Declan Ganley working with the CIA, I mean, what the hell? If that had been on Fox News we’d all be laughing! I read that in the Irish Times!
“Declan Ganley told me that his taxes got investigated three times and that the people coming to investigate him knew that politicians had ordered them just to rough him up... and they gave him a refund! The third time they said, ‘Oh look! We found in your favour!’ That is Chicago-style, machine gun politics. Then there was a banker who told me during the crisis, ‘I’m not going back to face Fianna Fáil judges.’ I mean, are we in The Sopranos? Yeah, there’s definitely a lot to be said about Irish politics.”
Guido Fawkes will be a guest speaker at All The News That’s Fit To Print?: Media Ethics And Politics, which takes place in the Leviathan tent in the Mindfield at 7.15pm on Saturday.
