After squealing all week about the DTI and blaming it and not his old pals, the ‘Phoenix Four’, for the sad demise of Rover, I’m sure that John Hemming will be delighted to find out, from the Observer, that no less than the ‘Iron Chancellor’ himself, Gordon Brown, is now insisting the government’s Rover Inquiry, to be headed up by Sir Bryan Nicholson, chairman of the Financial Reporting Council, looks carefully at the DTI’s role in proceedings…

…of course he might be rather less heartened by the news that the question Sir Bryan is being directed to ask is just what the hell possessed the DTI to allow Phoenix to buy Rover in the first place - a question for which he may be well placed to provide some answers given the extent to which ‘dined out’, politically speaking’ on his involvement in putting together the Phoenix takeover, over the last five years.

A crueller man than I might suggest that John may like to consider adding this website to his browser’s list of bookmarks/favourites.

“The Tories, every election, must have a bogey man. If you haven’t got a programme, a bogey man will do.”

Aneurin Bevan

Words that remain as true today as they ever were.

Memo to Party HQ. Please, please, if ever there was a poster for the faithful then that’s it. After all, it’s what we’re all thinking.

John Hemming’s blow by blow account of his fight to haul the government before a court and overturn the current postal voting system makes for compelling reading…

…I’m still pissing myself laughing after the last installment.

Hemming’s efforts to drag the government into court have all the hallmarks of a classic episode of Fawlty Towers in as much as just as you think things couldn’t get any more farcical, he manages to pull of something even more stupid than before. It’s not just that his case is raddled with flaws, one of which is so fundamental as to pretty much guarantee that his petition for a judical review will get thrown out straight away - and no, I’m not about to point out the problem, he can find it the hard way - but he seems not to have noticed that his whole case has been fundamentally undermined by his own party who, as PoliticalHack points out, were just as keen as Labour and Tories to keep in place the system that he’s now trying to have ruled out.

After all his bluster about obtaining cabinet minutes under the rules of disclosure, I wonder if he’ll now be asking for the same minutes that the Times (linked in PoliticalHack’s piece) have got hold of.

Great spot from Ian Hislop - or just as likely the programme researchers - on last night’s Have I Got News For You.

If, like me, you’ve spent much of the last few years engage with the trials and tribulations of parenthood then you may have found something hauntingly familiar about the Tory’s ‘Are You Thinking What We’re Thinking’ campaign slogan and found yourself left with a sense of deja vu then fear not, you have heard it all before.

Before revealing all, let me try and jog your memory a little with a sample of the original dialogue which inspired the Tory slogan…

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking, B2″

“I think I am, B1″

Got it? No?

Try reading it aloud, but this time with an Australian accent. See?

Yes, you’ve got it. The original source of the Tory’s campaign slogan is none other than that classic kids show Bananas in Pyjamas.