Old school reunion

Contrary to what some people believe, I'm not a class warrior, and this apart, I'm generally feeling pretty positive about the Cameron-Clegg coalition thus far. But there must be some truth in the suggestion that the two former public schoolboys' shared social background made it easier for them to deal with eachother than with gruff old, state school educated Gordon, and this spoof report from the Daily Mash hits the nail on the head.

The coalition deal was finally sealed yesterday evening during a hastily arranged phone call between David Cameron and Nick Clegg where they compared notes on the daughters of minor aristocrats that they had felt up at charity balls in the 1980s.

The Prime Minister's spokesman said: "We knew we had a workable, four-year deal when David and Nick both realised they had probably fingered the Hon. Charlotte Brampton during the same Henley Regatta."

Sheer, er, class.

Coalition to hold Inquiry into West Lothian Question

Forgive me if I'm wrong but I've not noticed any bloggers or journalists who have thus far picked up on this intriguing paragraph in the Lib-Con policy agreement document published yesterday:

We have agreed to establish a commission to consider the West Lothian Question

This could of course be no more than a means of kicking the issue into that bit of St James's Park where they can't quite get the mower - but it's certainly good to see it at least on the new government's agenda.

No to 55pc

In response to a request earlier from my old friend Toque, I joined a Facebook Group dedicated to blocking the new government's daft proposal to stop this and future parliaments from being dissolved on a simple majority.

Here is what I wrote on the wall:

The 55pc proposal is the one really, really stupid idea* in an otherwise very sensible and forward-looking policy agreement by the new coalition. I am generally in favour of fixed-term parliaments in so far as we need to curb the power of Prime Ministers to seek dissolutions at the most electorally advantageous time, but there must always be an override to allow for situations where the government has lost the confidence of the House. The measure of this is and should continue to be 50pc of MPs plus one. To try to set that bar any higher is completely undemocratic, completely unworkable, and in fact completely implausible, in that no government that had lost the confidence of a majority of the House could ever hope to retain the confidence of the public.

* That was written before Cameron made Coulson his Director of Communications - easily the coalition's worst decision so far.