Michael Gove, the Government Chief Whip, was left floundering when a Beyonce number started emanating from his watch during a Cabinet meeting.
London:
A senior leader of the UK's ruling Conservative Party was left red-faced at a Cabinet meeting after his watch started playing a Beyonce number and he was given a dressing down by Prime Minister David Cameron.
Michael Gove, the Government Chief Whip, was left floundering and he fumbled "for quite a while" when music started emanating from his watch during a Cabinet meeting.
Onlookers assumed it was the ringtone on his mobile phone, banned from such meetings on security grounds. One described it as "Jazz FM-style comedown music after a heavy night out" and another as a "female ballad", The Telegraph reported.
Red-faced Gove would not say what the tune was because it was "an in joke". But his wife gave the game away on the gaffe that took place during last week's Cabinet meeting.
Sarah Vine was more than happy to set the record straight in a newspaper column that the favoured tune was in fact "Beyonce's latest oeuvre".
Vine disclosed that it was not in fact the contraband mobile phone that had got her husband into hot water but a new Pebble Smartwatch she had bought him for Christmas.
"Despite its unprepossessing appearance, the Pebble is quite a powerful little thing," she explained.
"Not only can it tell the time, it can also pick up emails and text messages, screen calls, check the weather and, I'm told, control the boiler. Oh, and it can also play music. The trouble is that it takes a bit of getting used to," Vine was quoted as saying.
"And so it was that just as the Chancellor of the Exchequer was explaining a particularly complex piece of fiscal policy to Her Majesty's assembled Cabinet, my husband mistakenly instructed his watch to play Beyonce's latest oeuvre," she said.
Eventually, Gove managed to switch off the watch, but not before he had received a stern reprimand from the Prime Minister himself.
Michael Gove, the Government Chief Whip, was left floundering and he fumbled "for quite a while" when music started emanating from his watch during a Cabinet meeting.
Onlookers assumed it was the ringtone on his mobile phone, banned from such meetings on security grounds. One described it as "Jazz FM-style comedown music after a heavy night out" and another as a "female ballad", The Telegraph reported.
Red-faced Gove would not say what the tune was because it was "an in joke". But his wife gave the game away on the gaffe that took place during last week's Cabinet meeting.
Sarah Vine was more than happy to set the record straight in a newspaper column that the favoured tune was in fact "Beyonce's latest oeuvre".
Vine disclosed that it was not in fact the contraband mobile phone that had got her husband into hot water but a new Pebble Smartwatch she had bought him for Christmas.
"Despite its unprepossessing appearance, the Pebble is quite a powerful little thing," she explained.
"Not only can it tell the time, it can also pick up emails and text messages, screen calls, check the weather and, I'm told, control the boiler. Oh, and it can also play music. The trouble is that it takes a bit of getting used to," Vine was quoted as saying.
"And so it was that just as the Chancellor of the Exchequer was explaining a particularly complex piece of fiscal policy to Her Majesty's assembled Cabinet, my husband mistakenly instructed his watch to play Beyonce's latest oeuvre," she said.
Eventually, Gove managed to switch off the watch, but not before he had received a stern reprimand from the Prime Minister himself.
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