Angela Rippon and Alex Kingston among Strictly stars teaching MPs to cha-cha-cha

Strictly Come Dancing stars including Angela Rippon and Alex Kingston cha-cha-chad across Parliament’s Portcullis House with MPs.

Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle danced with Rippon after welcoming the celebrities from the BBC programme to Westminster to promote the advantages of dance for the nation’s health and wellbeing.

A group of more than 40 MPs stepped and twirled under the glass atrium of Portcullis House on Wednesday under the direction of choreographer Kai Widdrington.

New Green Party MP Hannah Spencer, shadow culture secretary Nigel Huddleston, Conservative MP Caroline Nokes and Labour’s Kim Leadbeater were among the parliamentarians practising their footwork alongside former Strictly contestant Kingston, professional dancers Flavia Cacace and Neil Jones and ex-judge Dame Arlene Phillips.

Before the class, Rippon said: “Dance can be such a valuable tool in getting the nation healthy and saving money.”

She urged politicians to encourage people to exercise, saying: “Collectively you can make a difference and individually in your constituencies you can do so much in supporting the dance teachers and the communities in your constituencies, helping them through dance, persuading all the GPs to use more social prescribing and write less expensive prescriptions.”

Sir Lindsay and Angela Rippon were joined by the likes of Dame Arlene Phillips, new Green Party MP Hannah Spencer and ex-Strictly professional Flavia Cacace (Stefan Rousseau/PA)PA Wire/PA Images - Stefan Rousseau

The 81-year-old veteran broadcaster, whose Let’s Dance initiative was inspired by her time on Strictly Come Dancing in 2023, said dance could help cure medical conditions, tackle the obesity and mental health crises and help older people.

“If we can get more people who are older to improve their core strength, their balance and their co-ordination and the strength in their legs, they will have less falls. Again we can save money on the NHS.”

The campaign has been backed by Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who described it as having a positive impact on people’s health and wellbeing, while helping to reduce the risk of developing serious illnesses.

The dancing was criticised in some quarters, with former Labour MP Zarah Sultana saying on X: “The optics of MPs doing Strictly Come Dancing in Parliament while the world teeters on the brink of World War Three is completely inappropriate.

“It says all you need to know about Westminster.”

And Reform UK’s Nadhim Zahawi, a former Tory minister, said: “A very bad look for Parliament when the Middle East is trying to free itself from a terrorist regime hell-bent on acquiring nuclear weapons that could put the United Kingdom at risk.”