The five most unpredictable stories about politicians in 2015

Abby Tomlinson with Ed Miliband

Politicians are usually painfully predictable creatures who fail to surprise and often disappoint. But this year's cohort proved they still have the ability to shock when some names appeared in headlines no-one could have anticipated (except perhaps for Charlie Brooker).

Kevin Spacey summed up the situation when asked by Stephen Colbert if any of the plot-lines on House of Cards ever felt implausible.

“There are times when I’ll leave the set and, you know, we’ll have shot a particular storyline, and I’ll think, man, this is really pushing it,” he replied. “And then I get back to the hotel and I turn on the news.”

Ed Miliband swanning off to Ibiza and becoming teen heartthrob of 2015

What's a Labour leader to do when he's lost the election in a humiliating defeat forever overshadowed by an unfortunate incident with a bacon sandwich? Why, don a v-neck, pack the kids off to the parents and head straight to Ibiza of course, which is where Ed Miliband was found after crashing out of an election so disastrous he was forced to resign shortly after. The “party animal” (as he was dubbed by The Morning Star) was snapped jetting back to the UK on an easyJet flight filled with a stag do a week later.

Things did get better for Ed after that, though, when he suddenly found himself the number one teen heartthrob and the milifandom club that no-one could have foreseen erupted.

Jeremy Corbyn and David Cameron talking about an 'ex-prostitute'

The premise of this story is fundamentally questionable in that Jeremy Corbyn and David Cameron making small talk feels wholly unlikely, never mind gossiping about which mutual acquaintance used to be married to a former sex worker. Corbyn even apparently told a joke (not one of his strong points) which made the Prime Minister laugh. Oh, and all of this was gleaned from the lip reader hired by The Daily Mail to analyse their conversation and denied by Corbyn's camp.

Pig Gate

Ah, the scandal that saw jaws drop across the country and left Black Mirror creator Brooker protesting (through laughter) that his infamous episode about a Prime Minister and a pig was not in any way inspired by any alleged past events.

"He's not going to dignify the allegations with a response," Downing Street retorted to requests for comment from journalists. But Cameron did, a few weeks later, when he categorically denied the allegations in front of a room full of Tory MPs. Everyone learnt a very important lesson from the product of Lord Ashcroft’s wrath: Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer. Oh, and his fellow politicians had a field day, too.

George Osborne's love of rap music

The Chancellor of the Exchequer revealed a surprising passion for rap music when he told The Mail on Sunday he went to watch NWA at Brixton Academy in the early 1990s and that it was the best concert he had ever attended. He also invited Dr Dre for tea at Downing Street, an invitation that was duly accepted.

Remember Osborne's 'u ok hun' moment in the Commons last year when the dazed Chancellor looked like he'd walked in straight from a night out? We still haven't got to the bottom of this one, but it does provide the perfect excuse to share this again.

Russell Brand and Ed Miliband

The Russell Brand/Ed Miliband love-in came as a surprise to everyone, largely because up until this point one of the two had been championing a revolution that involved shunning the political system in its current form. The outcome of this meeting was the comedian endorsing the former Labour leader (not that it helped much with the end result anyway).