Wes Streeting: “Twitter has especially become toxic and it's a productivity vacuum so I'm quitting it now.” Photo: David Woolfall
How do celebrities spend their precious free time? In our weekly 'My Saturday' column, celebrities talk about their weekend pros and cons. This week: Wes Streeting
9:00
There is no such thing as a typical Saturday in my life. Often I wake up in a Travelodge or Holiday Inn after a Friday night Labor fundraiser. My perfect Saturday morning is waking up in my own bed at home [in Barkingside, Ilford], spending Friday night with my feet up on the couch and watching a movie. If I am very lucky, I will sleep until 9 am. If I was in my 20s and you told me that I would be in bed at 9am, I would laugh.
10am
I usually get up before my fiancé Joe [communications consultant] . Breakfast is a protein shake, multivitamins and a cup of tea. Since recovering from kidney cancer in 2021, I have finally started to take my health more seriously. Depending on how energetic I am in the morning, I go to the gym – I go at any time from one to four times a week.
11:00 amSaturday morning is inevitably associated with agitation for the Labor Party. If I don't campaign in a key location somewhere where we need to win the next general election, I will be knocking on the doors of my Ilford North constituency. I am proud that I do this not only during elections. On days when the weather isn't great, I'm not going to pretend to be itching to go out and knock on doors like Jehovah's Witnesses, but I often find that socializing with the locals is like taking a warm bath. The county feels at home.
12:30
Lunch at my happiest place in the constituency, Cafe 104 in Barkingside, is my Saturday treat with Joe. It's always warm and friendly. They have a great all day breakfast menu and I will alternate between scrambled eggs with spinach and chorizo toast or halloumi salad and falafel. If this was one of those weeks in Westminster, I'll deviate from my usual healthy choice towards full English.
2:00 pm
We have to spend our Saturdays planning our wedding…but this year we're just getting started home furnishing. So we often spend our Saturday afternoon walking around the kitchen and bathroom, looking at the tiles. I used to be able to disguise myself in Tesco or around the neighborhood wearing jeans and a sweatshirt and not be recognized without a suit and tie. I'm afraid even a hoodie disguise doesn't work anymore, because people recognize me – but people are always friendly.
15:00
I have been writing my book for the last year. It was a labor of love, sitting with a laptop in the living room and writing. I thought it would be more like a routine, but I found it a cathartic experience, almost like therapy. While working on the book, I almost ended up in an episode of “Who Are You?” study of family history. To Joe's surprise, I even made it on time.
4:00 pm
Now I prefer to relax on Saturday afternoons. We both love to go out – it's a good way to relax and talk about our weeks. My social media use has fallen off a cliff – if you were talking to me five years ago, I'd say I'm hooked on Twitter. But Twitter in particular has become toxic, and it's a productivity vacuum, which is why I'm ditching it now. I think it's a terrible platform; if it collapses tomorrow, I'll be the first to give a round of applause. Trolling doesn't particularly touch me; I'm just zoning. The only social network I like is Instagram; I think it's much friendlier than Twitter. The only rabbit hole I sometimes fall into on a Saturday afternoon is watching Instagram videos of cats and funny sketches.
19:00
Joe has definitely brought cultural enlightenment into my life. I am one of those people who, especially in a stressful and busy job, enjoy sitting all day in front of the TV. Joe loves opera and I love going to the Royal Opera House too. I started out as a hostage, and now I must have Stockholm Syndrome. My favorite is Turandot, but I have a soft spot for Tosca as it is the first opera Joe and I saw together. If it were up to me, I would have chosen a West End musical, so for our 10th anniversary, I took it to The Lion King. It tells you where each of us is on the cultural spectrum.
8pm
If we don't go to the opera or have dinner with friends, we'll just sit in front of the TV. We tend to argue about the choice of film. I want to watch some action-packed Hollywood blockbuster; Joe will want to watch a movie in a foreign language with subtitles. I usually cook – maybe a very drunk bolognese (although marmite is my secret ingredient). My guilty pleasure is a large bar of Dairy Milk and a glass of milk.
9pm
I am a fan of big boxes. I'm catching up with Succession, which I really like. It's probably a bit overt now, but we're both big fans of The Golden Girls.
12pm
I usually fall asleep on the couch. Joe will wake me up and I will be very angry because I have to go to bed. I sleep with the phone by the bed; it's a terrible habit. My wasted years of walking and dancing in Soho until morning are long gone, now that I'm in my 40s.
As told by Claudia Rowan
In Wes Streeting's memoir One Boy, Two Bills and a Fry Up: A Memoir of Growing Up and Getting On out now (£20, Hodder & Stoughton). To order from Telegraph Books for £16.99 call 0844 871 1515 or visit books.telegraph.co.uk
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