This will weaken Cameron

David Davis's shock decision to resign from the Commons and fight a by-election over 42-day detention is, ostensibly at least, designed to mount a challenge to the moral authority of the Brown government.

In the longer-term, it could achieve just that. If Mr Davis is successful, it will explode the Prime Minister's claim that there is public support for the measure and make it much harder for Labour to use the Parliament Act to force the measure through the Lords.

But without doubt, this decision also has to be seen as a severe blow to David Cameron. It is clear there has been some almighty bust-up between the Tories' two main men, and as a result Mr Cameron's authority will now be seriously called into question.

Davis was also the best-performing member of the Shadow Cabinet by a mile and has consistently made all his opposite numbers at the Home Office appear "unfit for purpose" in John Reid's immortal words. If this is the end of his frontbench career, it will be a sad loss to the party - and potentially to the country to.

The right man wins

No, I don't mean Gordon Brown and 42 days, I'm talking about Lee McQueen and The Apprentice. And here, for anyone who missed it, is that famous Reverse Pterodactyl impersonation.



Incidentally Charlie Brooker had an interesting take on this exchange between McQueen and Paul Kemsley in his Screenburn column last Saturday. I record this in full below as I agree with every word of it.

"While we're on the subject of Lee, there was a glaring example of the show unfairly setting him up to look like a prick the moment his interview kicked off, when Johnny Vegas asked him to impersonate a pterodactyl, then sneered at him for not taking the interview seriously as soon as he did so. What is this, Guantánamo Bay? Why not really dick with his mind by asking him to take a seat, then kicking it out from under him and calling him a subservient seat-taking imbecile?"

So anyway, that's The Apprentice over with for another year. Lee may have deserved his victory last night, but my favourite candidate over the whole of this year's series was Jennifer Maguire, the self-styled "best saleswoman in Europe" who was fired after ballsing up the Marrakesh bazaar task.

Irish Jennifer came over as a bit of an ice-maiden during the programme, but, judging by this report, that wasn't her true personality at all.

Colin M. Howard 1944-2008

I realise this post will probably be of little interest to those who visit here primarily for the quality of the political analysis (!) but this is my online diary as well as my political blog and I could not let today go by without noting the passing of my former choirmaster and music teacher Colin Howard, who has died in Cape Town aged 63.

As this obituary from the Cape Town Opera website reveals, Colin died on 26 May after a battle with cancer. His death was only brought to my notice earlier today.

Colin was organist and choirmaster of St Mary's Church, Hitchin and Director of Music at Hitchin Boys' School in the 1970s, and one of the greatest men I have ever met. He taught me moreorless all I know about classical and choral music and being a part of the choir in his time was one of the most important and formative experiences in my life.

Alhough he did bring to the role a huge sense of fun, he never forgot that the work of a church choir was primarily about glorifying God. I cannot improve on this description of him that appears in his Cape Town Opera obituary.

"He believed there was a place in church for a wide spectrum of music, performed to the highest standards, to the glory of God. He also felt strongly that church musicians should be people concerned with spiritual growth, willing to be team players in helping to realise the multifaceted demands of being involved in the church."

Colin was one of two or three teachers to whom I owe a very great debt. I regret I never got the chance to tell him so to his face.

Cameron fudges English Parliament issue again

Today's Daily Telegraph contains an apparently authoritative leak from Ken Clarke's "Democracy Task Force" which is looking into, among other things, possible answers to the West Lothian Question for the Tories.

Its key revelation is that Clarke has retreated from the Tories' previous position of seeking to establish an "English Grand Committee" - effectively an English Parliament within a UK Parliament - to a bizarre fudge under which, while only English MPs will be able to discuss English-only laws at the committee stage, all MPs will get a vote on third reading.

Both Iain Dale and Little Man in a Toque have already been predictably scathing about this, and they are right, although I don't blame Clarke so much as David Cameron, whose timidity on this subject is becoming legendary.

The answer to the West Lothian Question is painfully obvious and has been well-rehearesed on this blog: to give England the same degree of devolution as Scotland and equivalent democratic representation to other parts of the UK. This will require the creation of an English Parliament. Who will be the first main party leader to recognise this straightforward political reality?