Finger on the pulse, Uppal, finger on the pulse

Yesterday in Parliament, the entire Labour Party got to their feet (it's a tradition thing) to demand a debate on the little matter of the News of the World hacking into the phones of murdered little girls, bombing victims and various other citizens.

It was particularly notable that the Conservative Party MPs stayed seated and silent. All the political parties are utterly guilty of outsourcing their policies - especially on immigration and trades unions - to the columnists of the Sun, Daily Mail and Express, but the Tories are on particularly shaky ground.

So you won't be entirely surprised to learn that my mediocre millionaire MP Paul Uppal was one of those Tories who kept schtum.

But he hasn't been wasting time. He knows what the great British public really care about, and it's not perverting the course of a murder investigation. It's this:

Glad to have spoken in popular debate on dangerous dogs, issue of owner responsibility needs addressing urgently.

Talking of guard dogs, I think recent events (especially the News of the World spying on a policeman investigating one of its private investigators in a murder enquiry) have solved the conundrum of quis custodiet ipsos custodes: it's the Murdoch press. And may I say what a fine job they're doing?