At our best when we are boring

My initial verdict on last Wednesday's Budget - written in a hurry between finishing work and picking my wife up from a hospital appointment - was intentionally rather tongue-in-cheek. A more considered verdict appeared on Saturday's Newcastle Journal and can be read in full HERE.

Milburn: Next election up for grabs

Northern Decision Makers - Alan Milburn part one
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I am pleased to be able to carry on this blog an interview with the former Labour cabinet minister Alan Milburn conducted by Graham Robb, an old friend from my days as Political Editor of the Newcastle Journal.

Together with Labour supporter Nick Wallis, former Tory election candidate Graham hosts a programme called "Northern Decision Makers" which features on his new broadband TV channel.

In the interview, which is in two parts, Mr Milburn says the next general election will be the closest since 1974 and argues that it is currently "up for grabs."

While he concedes that Gordon Brown could lose, he also predicts that so long as Labour gets the over-arching narrative right and presents a message of hope, the party will win an unprecedented fourth term.

The interview also contains some further interesting thoughts from Mr Milburn on the social moblity agenda which he has continued to champion during his time outside government.

It is well worth watching, and provides further proof in my view that a place should be found for the Darlington MP back at Labour's top table.

Northern Decision Makers - Alan Milburn part two
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Battle of the bloggers

Tonight's Question Time Extra on News 24 will see Tory blogfather Iain Dale going head to head with Labour Home's Alex Hilton, the man who once claimed that the raison d'etre of the Conservative Party was "lining up the entire British working class and buggering them one by one."

Should be compulsive viewing.