91Èȱ¬

Extraordinary, quite extraordinary. Anyone listening to David Miliband taking phone calls on Radio 2's Jeremy Vine show could be in no doubt.

This is a man testing the waters for a leadership bid and a man simply unprepared to come to the defence of a beleaguered prime minister.

Even when listeners poured abuse on Gordon Brown the most the foreign secretary could bring himself to say was that he was a prime minister in difficult times, that he had huge experience and good strong values - not exactly the warmest endorsement of the man who leads his party.

What's more, when listeners said how much they liked him he merely giggled and made jokes that these were not his friends or his mum who'd been paid to ring up - in other words he took all the praise and did nothing to deflect the abuse headed in Mr Brown's direction.

Whatever David Miliband's original intention was he has now begun a process where the country and his party will begin to judge whether he is a good replacement for Gordon Brown. It won't be long until some newspaper commissions a poll as to whether voters prefer him to Mr Brown.

If there is a Miliband poll bounce which is quite likely given the favourable publicity he's had and the extraordinary unpopularity of the prime minister, Labour MPs will begin to assess whether he's the man who might save their skins. In other words this will produce a momentum of its own.

Many cards remain, of course, in the prime minister's hands. On returning from holiday he could demote Mr Miliband, he could give him the poison chalice of the chancellor's job, or he might produce a new policy plan to regain the political initiative. However he will do so against the background in which for the first time since he faced Tony Blair, a genuine rival has emerged.

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What on earth did he mean by that? That is the only question that matters about today's extraordinary intervention by David Miliband in the debate about how the .

Now no doubt, he will say that we should understand him to mean precisely what he wrote and not a word more. Why then do I and most political observers refuse to take at face value? Quite simply because in politics context is all.

Consider the choices that faced the foreign secretary at a time when there is furious speculation about a challenge to Gordon Brown.

Firstly he could have called for that speculation to stop and for people to fall in behind the leader. He did no such thing. Indeed Gordon Brown is not even mentioned in his article.

Secondly he could have said nothing at all and simply gone on holiday. But oh no, he chose a third option. To set out the way forward for the party without doing anything to prop up his leader's position.

So what on earth did he mean by this? Not, I'm sure, an open challenge to Gordon Brown. The foreign secretary has no intention of trying to bring him down. On the other hand he does want to make it clear that in this leadership contest - if there is ever one - he will not hesitate, he is ready for the fight. And he will represent the candidate promising change.

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I breathed a sigh of relief yesterday when a Labour MP that he wanted Gordon Brown to go. This is not, I should stress, because I want to see the back of the prime minister. It was because I was becoming aware of the yawning gap between what was said to be happening in private - plots, cabinet coups and backbench revolts - and what politicians were saying in public.

Viewers, listeners and readers can conclude either that this gap exists because politicians say one thing in private and something very different in public. Or because political journalists talk things up. The truth, I would contend, is that there's a bit of both involved.

Since I'm still moonlighting on the at the moment (hence the rather irregular blogging) I discussed this issue on air this morning with two veterans of political reporting - Chris Moncrieff, the former editor of the Press Association and Elinor Goodman, the former political editor of Channel 4 News. You can hear our discussion here.

My main reflection, on the excitement of recent days, is that journalists should be prepared to admit that we don't know what's going to happen to Gordon Brown, because the politicians we speak to don't know, because they have yet to make up their minds.

What I can say with confidence is that the public words of support for the PM often do not reflect the private misgivings I hear. What's more, it's clear that many ministers and Labour MPs will spend the summer wrestling with their consciences, weighing up their personal interests and debating with their friends how to get the Labour Party out of the hole they're in.

The initiative always lies with political leaders. They can reshuffle their team, announce new policies, hold press conferences and the like. It takes someone or some group who are willing to risk their career and their reputation to bring a leader down. Often those people are not "the usual suspects" or the "men in grey suits".

It was, after all, an obscure Tory backbencher - Barry Porter - who first called on Margaret Thatcher to go and another - Sir Anthony Meyer - who ran as a stalking horse against her. It was Geoffrey Howe and not Michael Heseltine who brought her low.

It was Lib Dem MPs who were at the time relatively junior - Sarah Teather, Ed Davey and Michael Moore - who forced Charles Kennedy out.

The men or women, who may bring Gordon Brown down, are probably speaking to very few people now. It is the job of journalists to look for them but it is also our job to report the difference between talk and action.

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Listen very hard this morning for what Jack Straw is and isn't saying. The justice secretary has not called on the Labour Party to back Gordon Brown. Indeed he has not uttered any words himself at all since the Glasgow by-election.

Instead, allies of Mr Straw have said that he is urging rebels to "calm down". What that means is that he is asking for MPs who are pressuring him to bring about a change of leadership to ponder on the problems that would cause.

Firstly, it would be divisive. Secondly, the public might not like a party looking inward at the very time the voters want their concerns to be the top of the agenda. Finally though, and most importantly, Mr Straw has warned colleagues that a change of leader would trigger demands for an early general election for which Labour is particularly badly prepared at the moment.

It's interesting too to note that David Blunkett talked of there being no mechanism for removing Mr Brown today. I am not suggesting that Messrs Straw and Blunkett are secretly plotting against Mr Brown but what's clear is that they have not rushed to a full-throated declaration of approval either.

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It's a defeat which changes everything and yet also changes nothing.

The have proved beyond any doubt that there is now no safe haven for Gordon Brown from the winds of political change. Even in a so-called heartland area, even in an area of poverty and deprivation, even in Scotland, voters turned out to give him and his government a kicking.

This, though, is merely the latest installment of an electoral revolt which has been seen in the , in , in and, of course, in the .

So far, there's been but no significant figure has called for Gordon Brown to go. Indeed he's been backed by some formerly strident critics.

Though many in Labour - from the bottom of the party to the very top of the cabinet - have reached the conclusion they'd be better off without Mr Brown - they have also concluded that removing him could look recklessly indulgent, would certainly be bloody and would lead to demands for a swift general election the party would almost certainly lose. Thus, a challenge is likely to require another trigger.

This should give Gordon Brown time at his party conference, and in the run-up to it, to unveil more of the help he is promising for so-called "hard pressed families" and to warn, as he did today, of the risks to them of a Tory government.
. They may soon demand some proof that he's not a man simply shouting at the wind.

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It's morning after a . Gordon Brown will not be the only one who woke today with a very sore political head. The voters of Glasgow East have ensured that nowhere can now be called a safe Labour seat.

Overnight, a Labour majority of over 13,500 in Labour's formerly third safest seat in Scotland, and its 25th safest seat in the UK, simply vanished.

On polling day, the Westminster village - politicians and journalists alike - had convinced itself that Labour would just squeak home.

What's more, the collective mood was that it was time for the summer break, that the fate of the prime minister could wait until we all gathered again in the run-up for the conference season. Many, therefore, will have been shocked by the news they awoke to this morning. That means that what follows next is completely unpredictable.

Gordon Brown at least has an opportunity in the speech he gives today to describe how he plans to get himself, and his party, out of the hole they find themselves in. As he does, Labour MPs will be pondering whether their prospects are better with him or without. They will have the summer to debate, to discuss, to plot their next moves.

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I began a spot of moonlighting presenting the Today programme on Radio 4 this morning. Feeling pretty smug at not messing up I emerged from the studio to be told that I'd spent the whole of a discussion about a possible cure for cancer referring to prostrate instead of prostate cancer. One e-mailer has already quipped that my new disease is presumably caught from too much lying down. No, it comes from getting up much much too early.

Lucky I'm not giving up the day job.

PS. .

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Consider. Two stories. One day.

Story One - .

Story Two - .

There is, we are told, a new political consensus on the need for tough love to get people off welfare and into work, and the need to spend now to save later. The economics, on the other hand, couldn't be less propitious for such a change - jobs will be closing, welfare rolls expanding and public spending squeezed.

What's more, Incapacity Benefit claims have remained stubbornly high despite a series of ministers - Tory and Labour - promising to bring them down. There are a series of perverse incentives which have made it hard for them to bring about change:

• Ministers and officials have often preferred a higher IB count to a higher unemployment count

• IB claimants who might be able to work (and I know many can't) sometimes prefer, quite naturally, to be on a higher level of benefit long-term to the indignity and insecurity of moving between low-paid jobs and lower benefit levels

• The administrators of any system find it very hard to distinguish the truly unable to work from the malingerer and can be inclined to give the benefit of the doubt to people in poor areas who are not exactly going to be made rich by being put on IB

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"Them fiscul rools" is not a phrase heard often down the "Dog and Duck". No matter. The rewriting of the rules flourished so often by Gordon Brown to prove his prudence will have a real impact on the man and woman in the pub or at the water-cooler.

It will make it easier for the government to justify not putting up our taxes in the year to come and almost inevitable that they'll have to rise after that.

No wonder an economist told David Cameron at a Tory economic summit yesterday that "the next election is the one to lose".

The rule that matters in this story is the one that places a self-imposed limit on the amount the government can borrow. This year it's sure to be broken because the flow of taxes into the coffers is drying up and they have nothing saved for this very rainy day.

Ministers could hike taxes to deal with the problem. They could slash spending. They prefer, of course, to borrow more. Rewriting the rules will allow them to do just that.

They will, of course, argue that there's an economic case for not taking money out of people's pockets or cutting public spending at a difficult time. This will be countered by those who say it is the job of the using interest rates to ensure that the economy's not too hot and not too cold but just right.

This news poses real questions for all the parties:

Are Labour prepared to keep borrowing regardless of the fact that one day we'll all have to pick up the tab? Or could Alastair Darling behave as former Chancellors Ken Clarke and Roy Jenkins did - putting up taxes because they believed it was the economically right thing to do at the obvious political cost?

Will the Tories now make the case for a potentially unpopular combination of tax rises and spending cuts rather than the vote garnering tax cuts and spending rises?

Can the Lib Dems plausibly criticise the government for behaving as if there's "a pot of gold" to pay for tax cuts whilst themselves promising to cut the overall tax burden?

These are changed times, interesting times, defining times.

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That, quite fairly, is the question ministers ask whenever the Opposition parties so much hint at tax cuts. Today's postponement of the rise in fuel duty is just that - a tax cut. It's cost the Treasury more than £1billion. This follows hot on the heels of the £2.7 billion tax cut designed to buy off the 10p tax revolt.

Now, you might say, isn't the government getting a lot more cash in the form of oil tax revenues? The answer's yes but much of what they gain in oil tax they lose in VAT and corporation tax. They're also due to lose billions in stamp duty and corporation tax.

Someone will have to pay unless the government extends borrowing again. One of the big stories of the next 12 months will be the battle about who should ay and how much.

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You can watch me on show with analysis of the Prime Minister's Questions with presenters Andrew Neil and Liz Mackean. Dawn Butler and Iain Duncan Smith join in the discussion.

You can leave your comments below.

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are like the proverbial London bus. You wait a long time for one to come along and then two arrive at once. Last night the Tories tabled a motion to scrap the so-called "", among other things. Then, hey presto, a few minutes later, the government announced it would table a counter-motion, also claiming to scrap the John Lewis list.

Be careful - just as when you go shopping, it pays to look at the small print. The Tories' way of abolishing the list is to stop MPs claiming for things like fridges and TVs. Labour's way is to abolish the list of guide prices used by Commons officials, but to carry on allowing claims for household goods.

Before you assume that there is a monopoly of virtue on one side or the other, it's worth pondering why the difference in attitude between Tory and Labour MPs.

Labour MPs say to me that it's all very well for a wealthy Tory to claim over £20,000 a year in expenses in mortgage payments for a very pricey house that they had a huge deposit for. Labour MPs on the other hand often have smaller homes, pay off their mortgages because they have to, and therefore feel that they need that extra bit of money to pay for a new kettle or a fridge when it breaks down in their second home. You pays your money, and of course in the ballot box, you makes your choice.

Both motions are largely symbolic but how MPs vote today will indicate whether there is a chance of a new motion on expenses succeeding where the last one failed. It's an indication too that the two big parties now realise there are votes to be gained by being seen to take a lead on cleaning up their own house.

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Just as the Tories refused to rule out tax rises today the Liberal Democrats are lining up to promise them. Nick Clegg told a Journalists lunch today that he'd fight the next election on a "radical tax cutting programme for people on low and modest incomes" and he's lined up to spell out more detail in a document on Thursday. I understand that he's set to promise to seek to reduce the overall burden of taxation - if sufficient savings can be found.

Funny thing, politics. The Conservative leadership believes that it's crucial for their economic credibility not to look committed to tax cuts at all costs whilst the Lib Dems have spotted an opening for a party that promises to do what's necessary to do just that.

It'll be intriguing to see if Clegg stirs the voices on .

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When it comes to the economy David Cameron is in the position of the Irishman in the famous joke. Asked for directions he replies: "If I were you, I wouldn't have started here".

So it was, that on the radio this morning, previewing his speech to the , he answered most questions with that phrase, yes, you know the one - the government should have mended the roof when the sun was shining.

The Tory leader hurriedly corrected himself when he heard that he was about to describe his speech as a full blown economic plan, adding the phrase "a first go at".

The reason for this is clear; beyond vague talk about changing the bankruptcy rules, his speech today spells out existing Tory policies - about cutting stamp duty for the young and about the so called fuel tax stabiliser.

The Conservative leader studied economics at university and was political advisor to Norman Lamont during the last major economic downturn. He will now know that this will not be an economic plan that takes him into government, if he gets there, and that the Tories will have to be thinking about what on earth they would actually do if they inherited an economy that was growing very slowly or worse still in actual recession.

Most telling in the interview I thought was Mr Cameron's reply when asked whether whoever was in government they would have to put up taxes. He replied: "I hope that's not the case." "Hope", I notice, rather than "believe".

The next great economic debate in the Conservative Party will not be the one that David Cameron and George Osborne have already won - about changing Labour's spending plans in the short term - but whether substantial tax cuts are needed, not for political reasons but to stimulate a faltering economy.

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The home secretary on Monday afternoon in the House of Commons:

"I never said, and nor would it be sensible, for young people to be trailed through A&E wards while people were being served."

The 91Èȱ¬ Secretary yesterday speaking to Adam Boulton on Sky News:

Boulton: And one of those proposals is that people caught carrying knives should be taken to see people in hospital who have been stabbed or to meet the families of victims, is that correct?

Jacqui Smith: It is

Not a U-turn as such but a very belated attempt to clear up the important confusion between taking those who wield knives to meet volunteer doctors and victims who can force them to confront the consequences of their actions and forcing victims and doctors to meet those who caused the wounds in the first place.

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On hearing the news that Russia and China have vetoed the UK/US sanctions resolution at the United Nations I recalled the question I put at the Prime Minister's news conference at the end of the G8 summit.

I wanted to check what I was being told off the record - namely that the Russians would abstain and that any suggestion otherwise was due simply to a timelag between what their President had signed upto in Japan and the Russian Ambassador to the UN getting the word in New York.

I asked Gordon Brown :

"Prime Minister did the President of Russia tell the G8 that his country would back sanctions at the United Nations targeted at Zimbabwe, and if so why did his Ambassador at the UN describe the sanctions as quite excessive and in conflict with the notion of sovereignty?"

He replied :

"For the first time the G8, including every country within the G8, has come out in favour of sanctions against Zimbabwe and it is clear in the script that was issued last night by the G8 about our views about the deteriorating situation in Zimbabwe".

To be fair he did go on to say that

"the G8 resolution is about the general approach to sanctions, agreed by all members of the G8, the UN resolution proposed by the United Kingdom and the USA takes that forward with very specific proposals about sanctions against named individuals and about the arms embargo, and I hope people in the UN Security Council will find it possible to support this resolution"

Incidentally, we were also briefed that the Chinese would not risk a veto on an issue marginal to their interests so close to the Olympics.

So, reporters were briefed wrongly. Was the PM? And, if so, why did the diplomats get it so wrong?

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When David Davis shocked Westminster by resigning his seat I reported the fury within Team Cameron which led them to describe his decision as "personal" - meaning taken without consultation with his leader or other colleagues - and "courageous" - which I translated as political code for "mad".

I predicted that whatever happened it would damage the Tories since the man who was defeated for the Tory leadership would be able to claim his own electoral mandate and thus have an independent status on the backbenches if he won his by-election.

Never before have my predictions provoked such anger or such a flurry of complaints. I was accused both of mis-representing David Cameron's real views and of under-estimating the public's support for David Davis.

In short I was told repeatedly that I was prisoner of the Westminster village who "just didn't get it". So, on the morning after the by-election night before what's my verdict now?

I'm sorry to disappoint my critics - or perhaps confirm them in their view - but I've not changed my mind. Except, that is, on one point. I did under-estimate the extent to which the act of resigning on an issue of principle would elevate David Davis in the eyes of many in this profoundly anti-political age. The turnout and majority he got, in what turned out to be a non-election, was a reflection of the high status he has in his constituency.

However, I hold to the view that, whether he means to be or not, he will be a destabilising presence for David Cameron whether he stays on the backbenches or is eventually given another job.

The last time I faced such flak for a prediction was a long time ago - when Clare Short attacked Tony Blair's spindoctors as "men in the dark" when Labour were still in opposition. When Blair and Short cobbled together a statement saying they agreed with each other I described them as "like a married couple" who'd stayed together for the sake of the children or, in this case, the Labour Party.

The problem, I continued with my over-extended metaphor, was that if you invited them for dinner they'd end up having a row and throwing the crockery at each other.

This prediction led Peter Mandelson to try to have me sacked. For years afterwards as Short sat, apparently comfortably, in Blair's Cabinet I worried that I'd got it wrong. Then, along came the Iraq war...

Perhaps the diplomatic thing to say to minimise the risk of triggering yet more complaints is, as Deng Xiaioping once famously remarked when asked for his view of the French Revolution, "It's too early to tell".

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Wouldn't it have been easier to pick up the phone? It certainly would have been cheaper than the multimillion-pound jamboree that this gathering of the world's leaders of the world's eight richest countries has become.

On the other hand, at the end of his first summit, Gordon Brown believes it's been worthwhile. He's been in his element here, plotting the small steps necessary to reach the major deals that he hopes will be reached in the future.

In truth, on each of the areas that he's highlighted, the deals have yet to be done. On Zimbabwe, the G8 did agree to take tougher measures, but overnight the Russians are sounding deeply sceptical about the sanction proposals that Britain and America have tabled at the UN in New York.

On trade, the prime minister talks of us being a "minute from midnight", and a greater hope for a deal than there has been before, but the deal will be done, not in Japan, but, if it's ever done, in Geneva in 12 days time.

On climate change, the G8 talked of a new vision but it is a new American president, and the leaders of the emerging economies like China and India, who will decide whether a deal is in fact done in 2009.

And even on development aid, where the prime minister deserves some credit for stopping other countries from watering down their promises, many countries have yet, of course, to deliver their old ones.

Real business was done at the G8 and indeed at what were effectively two other summits, with the developing economies and with the African nations. There's no doubt some progress was made at this G8 summit but the real test of it will come in negotiations yet to be held.

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After the fog of worthy declarations and statements of intent, the diplomatic air finally cleared in the Japanese mountains tonight. The G8 spoke as one, and without ambiguity on Zimbabwe, declaring Robert Mugabe's regime to be illegitimate and pledging to introduce sanctions against those using violence to back it.

It is not here at the G8 that the details of those sanctions will be worked out. That will come at the United Nations in New York, perhaps within the next 24 hours. It is thought that they are likely to be modelled on the EU's existing sanctions against 131 of the closest individuals to Robert Mugabe.

The aim will be to target their finances, and to ensure that they can't move their bank balances and their savings elsewhere, and not to hit the finances of ordinary Zimbabweans.

This agreement required the Russian president to drop his previous objections to interfering with Zimbabwe's internal affairs. It also required the G8 to finally give up on the quiet, and so far largely fruitless, diplomacy of South Africa, and to ignore the warnings of some African leaders here in Japan that any further moves against Robert Mugabe would lead to further internal violence.

UPDATE 07:00PM: Here's my interview with the prime minister from earlier today.

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The spouses of the G8 leaders were invited to drive the latest Japanese electric car around the summit venue today. Gordon Brown hopes we may all be tempted to do the same sooner than we think.

The prime minister is hailing a breakthrough at the G8 on a climate change deal. A breakthrough which involves the American's agreeing for the first time to a 50% target reduction for green house gas emissions and a list of 25 ways in which the world can get more energy efficient, including those electric and hybrid cars.

The sceptics will note, of course, that the American agreement is conditional on a wider climate change deal in Copenhagen next year, involving the developing countries like China and India. This is more a step on the way than any sign that that deal will actually take place.

The prime minister is being credited behind the scenes with ensuring that the G8 did not backslide on its commitments to African development. The Italians and the French in particular were said to be keen to water down commitments made at the Gleneagles G8 summit in 2005 to double aid for Africa.

Gordon Brown looks pretty satisfied with the work of his first G8 summit, much less so by questions that came from all political journalists about whether this might be his last.

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THE WINDSOR HOTEL, LAKE TOYA, NORTHERN JAPAN: "I don't begrudge them their piss-up". So said Saint Bob of Africa, on the morning after the G8 leaders' night before.

Campaigners for Africa care less about the champagne and caviar consumed last night than whether the G8 leaders agree to deliver the menu of promises they've made in recent years.

Haggling is still going on behind the scenes to stop the French, the Italians, and, apparently, the Canadians, from watering down the promise of $50bn extra aid, including half of that for the continent of Africa.

I am standing by the hotel where the leaders are meeting, waiting for an interview with Gordon Brown. The normally spectacular view is covered with cloud and a low haze. It's not a bad metaphor for the results that are emerging from this summit.

In truth, even when it ends, we will not know whether there will ever be delivery for Africa, a new world trade deal, or an agreement on climate change. That too, despite the best endeavours of the leaders here, remains hazy.

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G8 SUMMIT, HAKKAIDO, JAPAN: Has Prudence left the Treasury to move into the nation's kitchens? Will "Mr Brown's Book of Household Management" be the prime minister's next magnum opus? What tips does the PM have on how to turn your leftovers into a nice soup or a stew?

I suspect that the PM knew that he'd be mocked for his tip to the nation's households to save themselves eight quid a week by wasting less food. I suspect that he also knew, however, that it would be a story that the media couldn't resist and which would highlight that he was, at least, trying to do something about those soaring bills at the supermarket.

He is trying to demonstrate how people themselves as well as his government and the G8 can help us all to live with rising food prices. His aim is to demonstrate that he is helping top create a global plan to deal with one of the public's top concerns.

To cut prices, the prime minister wants to increase the supply of food and to decrease demand for it.

Thus, he wants the G8 to help Africa to double her food production.

Thus, a government commissioned report will today advise ministers on how they can ensure that subsidies for biofuels don't stop farmers growing corn for food to grow it to produce alternatives to petrol. The message of the Gallagher Report is, apparently, that the ministers should subsidise "good" biofuels - ie those that don't substitute for food - and not "bad" ones that do.

And, thus, the PM advises us not to bin the stuff we never quite got round to eating or, better still, not to buy it at all. Much more significant than that waste, of course, is the estimated 40% of food that never makes it from harvest to our tables and trays thanks to losses in the processing, storing and transportation of food.

Back when the G8 (or the G6 as it was then) was founded - in the early 70s - the leaders of the world's richest countries discussed how to change interest and exchange rates. These days they are relatively impotent in the face of similar pressures. That is why, perhaps, we're left talking about what to do with your leftovers. Risotto or omelette are my favourites...

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THE TARMAC, HEATHROW: Waiting to fly to the G8 summit with the PM where he will be discussing the state of the economy food, fuel and climate change. Interesting to note that having failed to charter a BA plane our transport had to fly in from Dallas,Texas. The carbon footprint's not looking too good...

Update 1752BST: NOVOSIBIRSK, SIBERIA Refuelling. Our plane took Bruce Springsteen on his European tour and sometimes carries the Dallas Mavericks basketball team. Gordon Brown looking surprisingly relaxed.

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MPs risk having turned themselves from heroes to zeroes in the space of just one afternoon.

Having won themselves plaudits for turning down recommended pay increases, they have voted to keep their expenses system - so much criticized - just as it was. In other words, those payments for new kitchens for MPs' second homes go on, as does the notorious "John Lewis list" which sets out maximum payments to purchase a new plasma chest of drawers for that home in London or the constituency.

Now plenty of MPs will point out that the recommended reforms of the system wouldn't have saved the public any money and indeed might have cost more, given the burden of external auditors coming to snoop their way in to MPs' affairs. The controversy that is burning tonight though is whether Gordon Brown's government behaves like every other previous government has done, keeping a hard line on MPs' pay while turning a blind eye to their allowances.

The Tories are claiming that ministers went AWOL during the expenses vote and that if they turned up, the new expenses system would have been passed and not rejected as it was. I'm going to be checking the .

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"Hair shirts this way" they cried as MPs confounded expectations by voting for pay restraint not just this year, but for several years to come.

Thus, they rejected the recommendations of an independent review that said that they needed roughly a 10% hike in their pay over the next few years.

The debate was filled only with those who called for MPs to have the courage to defy public opinion and increase their pay. Those such as Tory MP who said that "We have a responsibility for making mega mega decisions. And for that we're getting the level of pay of a 2nd tier officer in a district council."

The Commons has now moved to a vote on their expenses and allowances and I suspect having felt the pain on pay will be determined not to feel it there as well.

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Stand by.

themselves an above-inflation pay rise and to reject a package of reforms of their controversial .

Today the Commons votes on the government's proposal that they should stick to a non-inflation busting pay rise. The signs are, though, that they may well vote for one of a series of amendments involving pay restraint this year but above inflation top ups in years to come.

Those behind the move insist that they will merely be implementing the recommendations of an independent review and, therefore, only paying themselves what they're entitled to.

Equally controversially, MPs may, according to sources on all sides in the House, reject the recommendations of the Speaker's committee which proposed not just greater transparency and reform of the rules but also a powerful and intrusive audit of MPs' expenses.

Those leading the rebellion claim this would be a costly waste of money as a result of paying outside consultants. They claim that the Speaker's (Members' Estimates) Committee are where none are necessary and doing so in a hasty and ill thought out way.

If they win the day, the system of payments for flat screen TVs (off the so-called ) and kitchen re-fits go on. One of those leading the backbench revolt told me that if he needed a new fridge for his second home which he needs because he works in two places, he was perfectly happy to make that case.

Let's be clear, there is no monopoly of virtue in one set of proposals or another. They give MPs roughly the same amount of money and in both cases the details of MPs' claims would have to be published regularly.

Many MPs will face a dilemma - to vote for something they don't like - pay restraint and expenses reform to get the critics off their backs - or to risk headlines declaring that MPs have voted themselves a pay rise they reject for others whilst binning proposals to reform their allowances.

It will be fascinating to see how they grapple with this choice in the hours ahead before the vote this evening.

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You can watch me on show with Andrew Neil and Anita Anand. We're discussing Prime Minister's Questions with Hazel Blears and Chris Grayling.

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Arise Sir Keith or will it be Lord Vaz or Governor of Bermuda?

What began as a barbed joke at the expense of the chairman of the 91Èȱ¬ Affairs Select Committee, Keith Vaz turned into a significant exchange at today's Prime Minister's Questions.

Just nine minutes before PMQs began the Telegraph dropped a cracking about a letter sent by Labour's Chief Whip to Mr Vaz .

It was written the day after the knife edge vote on 42 days detention without charge which Gordon Brown only just won and, according to the Telegraph, read as follows:

"Dear Keith...Just a quick note to thank you for all your help during the period leading up to last Wednesday's vote. I wanted you to know how much I appreciated all your help."
"I trust that it will be appropriately rewarded!...With thanks and best wishes, Geoff."

David Cameron - who'd clearly been forewarned about the story - used it to demand to know what plain old Mr Vaz, for now at least, had been promised. Of course, we'll probably never know. What's more, if anything was promised or even hinted at it's much less likely to be delivered now.

I suspect that Geoff Hoon will say that he was teasing Mr Vaz after the jokes that had been circulating around the Commons about what had been promised.

What may prove more significant in the long term is the PM's repetition of his claim that "no deals" were done to secure victory. If, as they expect, Northern Irish MPs soon greet extra government investment or a concession on this or that government proposal it is a claim that will be scrutinised very hard.

Of course, deals are done all the time in Westminster in the search for coalitions needed to win tight votes (although they're usually implicit rather than explicit so as to be deniable.)

This begs the question - why when first asked about deals did Gordon Brown offer up yet another hostage to fortune rather than simply declaring that he'd done what was necessary to make the country safe whilst dismiss talk of deals as Westminster village tittle tattle?

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"Don't penalise the drivers of older cars"... "Compensate the 10p tax losers"... "Help hard-pressed families dependant on public sector wages"... "Don't force businesses to move abroad to escape higher taxes."

The demands on the public finances grow and grow just as they themselves are shrinking. Corporation tax revenue from the financial services is going down. Stamp duty from the slumping housing market is, some believe, likely to halve.

If unemployment does go up, as some predict, that will be yet another cost on the Exchequer. There is, therefore, a gap between what politicians of all parties are demanding and the cash to pay for it. And very little of our political debate just now is about where to find the money.

It can only come from one of two places: Spending much less or taxing more. That latter option seems to be politically almost impossible.

The Treasury has come up with wheeze after wheeze to raise more tax and every one is met with huge public resistance. The problem the Chancellor faces, having backed down repeatedly on tax in the past year, is that people have learned that if they shout loud enough, they get their way.

What voters would be well advised to do is ask any politician, or indeed, anyone else demanding extra spending, where on earth will the money come from?

PS: Can't help noticing the in the Times this morning, penned by the newspaper's new chief leader writer Danny Finkelstein. The leader demands a clearer vision from David Cameron and is written by an arch Tory moderniser. Intriguing.

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It was the votes of Scottish MPs which ensured that students at English universities have to pay top-up fees. Even though Scottish students at Scottish universities do not have to pay them, thanks to a decision of the Scottish Parliament.

That sort of thing, say the Tories, should never happen again. They've rejected one idea for dealing with it - the creation of an English Parliament alongside Westminster. They used to argue that the answer was English votes for English laws. In other words that Scottish MPs should be barred from voting on issues that only affect the English.

That of course would stop Gordon Brown from voting on schools and hospitals. It might also mean in future that a prime minister wouldn't have a majority in Parliament for much of his party's election manifesto.

That is why a committee led by has today suggested watering down the idea saying that the government must be allowed to control its own agenda and its own budget, but that English MPs should be able to control the details of what is done in England in their name.

It's an idea that's been rejected by government ministers but also by another senior Conservative , who argued that if English MPs only control amendments to new laws, tuition fees would still have been able to go through Parliament thanks to Scottish MPs' votes.

Ken Clarke's hope is that governments in future will be forced to do deals, to bargain as they do now with The House of Lords, with English MPs. What today demonstrates though is how hard it is to design something that deals with an English grievance and is actually workable and doesn't risk destroying the union which the Tories say they want to protect.

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