Former London mayor publishes report showing women are much more heavily affected by the cuts than men

London mayoral hopeful Ken Livingstone has accused the government of declaring "a war on equality" as he published a report showing that women in London are paying twice as much as men for the government's cuts in public spending.

Livingstone, who is hoping to be selected as the Labour candidate for the 2012 mayoral election in a two-horse race with Oona King, has drawn together evidence that shows women are more heavily affected by cuts in housing benefit and pension changes.

Even if cuts in child benefits and family-related tax credits are discounted, women are paying for 66% of the cuts in London, the report claimed.

The document, A Mayor for Equality, suggest women are more heavily affected by cuts in housing benefit and the switch to the Consumer Price Index for calculating the additional state pension and public sector pensions.

Livingstone also cited planned cuts in public sector jobs, where women represent 65% of the workforce, often in lower paid jobs.

The reality of women's lives would mean they would end up filling more of the gap left if public services are cut, he warned, such as caring roles for children and other family members, he added.

Livingstone has made protecting Londoners from government cuts a key feature of his campaign, as he seeks to tie planned government cuts with Boris Johnson's Conservative mayoralty.

As ballot papers for the mayoral selection begin to arrive at the home of Labour's 35,000 party members and 392,000 London party affiliates, the former London mayor, who was ousted by Boris Johnson after eight years in office, honed his message to women voters in a bid to secure a place at the 2012 mayoral election.

Promising to place equality at the heart of his mayoral programme, Livingstone outlined measures to improve the quality of life for the 3.8 million women living in London, including improving skills and training support through the London Skills Board, giving priority to tackling the growth of the sex industry and trafficking, and supporting a new London Carers Alliance to support London's 600,000 carers.

"Women in London are just over 50% of Londoners but the evidence now shows they will bear the majority of the cuts and higher fares of David Cameron and Boris Johnson," said Livingstone,

"The most cautious estimate shows women are paying for more than two thirds of the housing and pensions cuts. It is clear [the chancellor] George Osborne has not given any regard to the impact on women of his savage budget cuts."

Livingstone gave his backing the Fawcett Society, which filed papers with the high court last month seeking a judicial review of the government's recent emergency budget.

Under equality laws, the government should have assessed whether its budget proposals would increase or reduce inequality between women and men. Despite repeated requests, the Treasury has not provided any evidence that any such an assessment took place.

It emerged last month that Theresa May, the home secretary and equalities minister, had warned the chancellor that cuts in the budget could widen inequality in Britain and ran a "real risk" of breaking the law.

The letter was sent to Osborne on 9 June, less than a fortnight before his emergency budget, and was copied to the prime minister.

Last month Mark Hoban, the Treasury minister, stonewalled questions on BBC Radio 4's Today programme about whether the government had carried out a statutory assessment of the impact of the budget on women, ethnic minorities, disabled people and the elderly.

Livingstone claimed Boris Johnson, who succeeded him as mayor in 2008, has made his own attacks on equality, citing as one example a reduction in the number of women in senior positions at the Greater London authority.

A spokesman for the mayor hit back. "London is now greener, cleaner and safer than when Boris took up the tenure as mayor and he is tirelessly fighting to protect London's financial settlement and crucial transport infrastructure during the worst recession since World War II.

"We now have the lowest murder rate in the capital since 1978 and this year's Annual London Survey tells us that people feel happier and safer with 83% of Londoners satisfied with their city as a place to live which is the highest level recorded under any mayor."

Livingstone's rival in Labour's mayoral selection, Oona King, will unveil her policy on women's equality at an event in Westminster tomorrow evening.

This will include appointing an equalities adviser to work across the GLA, a kite mark for businesses that carry out equal pay audits and a drive to reduce prostitution and sex trafficking in the runup to the Olympics.

King, a former MP for Bethnal Green and Bow, said: "There's a mountain of evidence to show that men and women don't have the same life chances. This problem is worse in London than anywhere in the country, and will worsen further as the Tory cuts start to bite.

"I'm the best candidate to be mayor because I have a track record of delivering for women - my first legislation helped low-paid women, and increased workplace equalities.

"We have to make London's streets and transport safer for women, help pull women and their children out of poverty, improve jobs training, and get more women into jobs as representatives. Boris isn't interested in this."

The results of the mayoral selection will be announced just ahead of the Labour party conference later this month.

Reducing funding for household generation of renewable energy will jeopardise job creation and energy security, Huhne is told

A coalition of green, countryside and housing groups has warned energy secretary Chris Huhne not to cut subsidies for green electricity and heating as part of the government's spending review. The 22 groups, including green energy trade body RenewableUK, the National Farmers Union and the Federation of Master Builders, said in a letter to Huhne that cutting schemes that subsidise household generation of renewable energy would jeopardise job creation, energy security and greenhouse gas targets.

The move was sparked by comments from the Department of Energy and Climate Change's minister of state, Charles Hendry, who recently said he was "closely reviewing" the £27bn renewable heat incentive (RHI) scheme due to start in April next year to encourage the take-up of green heating devices such as heat pumps, and the £8bn feed-in tariff (FIT) launched in April which pays small-scale generators of green electricity.

"We inherited a situation where we could see who was going to benefit commercially but we couldn't really see how it was going to be paid for and that it would create pretty substantial bills," Hendry told the Telegraph in an article that suggested both schemes could be "slashed". Justine Greening, economic secretary to the Treasury, also recently attended a launch of a report by the right-leaning Policy Exchange thinktank that was highly critical of the FIT and the RHI. "...We will focus on the most cost-effective approaches [to tackle climate change]," said Greening at the event. "In fact, the more you care about climate change, the more value for money counts. We have to make sure every penny saves the maximum emissions possible. And we will put a stop to the last government's obsession with equating high levels of expensive inputs with high impact."

The rate paid for the feed-in tariff is currently due to be reviewed in 2012 and its introduction has caused a solar gold rush in the UK as a record number householders and business installing solar photovoltaic panels to earn the tariff. But the groups behind today's letter are worried such language from senior government figures indicate the FIT and the RHI could be victims of the comprehensive spending review, the results of which are due to be published on 20 October.

"As you know, heat is responsible for 47% of UK emissions and 49% of UK energy demand, so no government serious about climate change or energy security can ignore half the problem," wrote the signatories, including Howard Johns of the Solar Trade Association, William Worsley of the Country Land and Business Association and David Caro of the Federation of Small Businesses. The letter continues: "Costs come down when the industry can plan and invest with confidence, and economies of scale are achieved - that is one of the simple aims of these policy mechanisms."

Ed Miliband, shadow energy secretary and Labour leadership candidate, also warned today of cutting the schemes. "This government promised to be the greenest ever but it is already betraying this promise," he said. " Unless we go ahead with the feed-in tariff and renewable heat incentive as planned, we will never achieve the greening of our energy supplies that we need. Instead of creating uncertainty and delay, the government should reaffirm the commitments made by the previous Labour government."

A spokeswoman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said accusations that the RHI was going to be "slashed" were speculation. "The government is doing what people would expect any responsible government to do, especially in the current economic climate," she said. "That is looking across all our policies and inherited spend, which includes the not insubstantial costs associated with the proposed renewable heat incentive and the feed-in tariff scheme, to ensure that what is being spent is being spent in the best and most efficient way." Climate minister Greg Barker recently also wrote that feed-in tariffs were "at the heart of our efforts to 'green' Britain".

Labour MP and sustainability adviser for Friends of the Earth, Alan Simpson, said that mixed messages from government would scare off investors: "You have government scaring the living daylights out of local authorities and businesses, but also the investment community who look at long-term signals. So you risk all investment decisions being put on hold, because different ministers are saying 'maybe we will, maybe we won't' - it sends completely the wrong messages."

In a separate development today, M&S became the latest household name to offer solar panels to consumers. Following British Gas's launch of solar photovoltaic products last week, the high street retailer said it had partnered with Scottish and Southern Energy to offer solar photovoltaic panels and solar thermal systems.

Former Labour minister writes to Downing Street calling for investigation with subpoena powers after New York Times story

The Labour MP Tom Watson has called for a full judicial inquiry into allegations of widespread illegal phone-hacking at the News of the World.

Watson, a former minister, has written to No 10 asking David Cameron to set up a wide-ranging inquiry into the relationship between the Metropolitan Police and News International, which publishes the News of the World. The letter is addressed to the deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg, because Cameron is on paternity leave.

A judicial inquiry has the legal authority to subpoena witnesses and would enjoy similar powers to those handed to the Hutton inquiry into the death of the weapons scientist David Kelly in 2003.

Watson's intervention follows a New York Times report published online late on Wednesday which alleged that the Met failed to pass evidence of phone-hacking to the Crown Prosection Service.

According the New York Times: "The officials didn't discuss certain evidence with senior prosecutors, including the notes suggesting the involvement of other reporters, according to a senior prosecutor on the case. The prosecutor was stunned to discover later that the police had not shared everything. 'I would have said we need to see how far this goes' and 'whether we have a serious problem of criminality on this news desk,' said the former prosecutor."

Referring to this allegation in his letter to No 10, Watson wrote: "The testimony given to the NYT is that the police did not share all the relevant information with the CPS. And that if they had done, the CPS would have reached different conclusions. These are clear grounds for a judicial inquiry. Please can you confirm your intention to recommend one."

Watson also called for a full investigation by the Independent Police Complaints Commission into the paper's allegations of collusion between News International and the Met.

"The New York Times also suggests direct police collusion with a commercial media organisation, an investigator alleging that a Metropolitan Police press officer attempted to suppress investigation in order to protect the police's "long-term relationship with News International," he wrote. "Please can you confirm that the Independent Police Complaints Commission will investigate this serious allegation from a highly reputable source without delay."

The New York Times alleged last night that Andy Coulson, the Conservative Party's director of communications, actively encouraged reporters to obtain information by hacking into mobile phones and listening to voicemail messages when he was editor of the News of the World.

The paper quoted an ex-News of the World journalist, Sean Hoare, a former friend of Coulson, saying he personally played recordings of hacked voicemail messages for him when both men worked at the News of the World's sister title The Sun. Later, according to the paper, when Hoare worked for Coulson at the News of the World, he "continued to inform Coulson of his pursuits. Coulson 'actively encouraged me to do it', Hoare said".

The paper also quotes an unnamed former editor who worked for News International claiming that Coulson talked openly about illegal phone-tapping techniques.

Coulson has always maintained he know nothing about the activity and said in response to the New York Times story: "I absolutely deny these allegations."

News International executives told the Commons culture select committee that Clive Goodman - the paper's former royal editor, who was jailed for intercepting voicemail messages in January 2007 along with a private investigator, Glenn Mulcaire - acted alone. Coulson resigned as News of the World editor after Goodman was jailed.

The New York Times also alleged that the Met had not passed full details about how many people were victims of the illegal practice to the CPS because it has a history of cooperation with News International titles. It quoted an unnamed prosecutor who expressed surprise that the Met had failed to alert it to evidence that suggested other News of the World reporters had indulged in the practice on Coulson's watch.

The New York Times report, which be published in the paper's weekend magazine on Sunday, revealed that three people - including Brian Paddick, a former Met commander - are seeking a judicial review into Scotland Yard's handling of the case.

Watson is a member of the Commons culture select committee, which reopened its investigation into press standards after the Guardian revealed last year that News International had paid off three victims of phone-hacking, including the PFA chief executive Graham Taylor, in exchange for their silence.

Paul Farrelly, the Labour MP for Newcastle-under-Lyme, who is also a member of the committee, criticised the Metropolitan Police today and called on them to make more evidence available. "The police must come clean on all the evidence they collected, why much of it was not shown to prosecutors and why all suspected victims have not been alerted," he said. "For one of the most senior of its former officers [Brian Paddick] to request a judicial review of the police investigation is unprecedented and the Met needs to let the public know its response."

Farrelly added that MPs were likely to consider the fresh revelations when parliament reconvenes next week. "With Andy Coulson our inquiry hit a brick wall of silence and amnesia. There is plenty more in the NYT article, however, which suggests illegal phone-hacking was rife and not limited to just the former royal editor and one private investigator," he said.

"The select committee will, no doubt, want to discuss the NYT article and any further developments or responses. The NYT article further shines further light into this murky affair, in which both News International and the Metropolitan Police have so far been evasive, to say the least."

The Met issued a statement today denying that it failed to pass on key evidence. "The Met does not consider that the issues raised by the New York Times accurately reflect how the investigation was conducted, constitute new evidence, or lead us to change our position", it said.

"The CPS had full access to all the evidence gathered and the final indictment appropriately represented the criminality uncovered.

"The case was the subject of the most careful investigation by very experienced detectives and has been subject to extensive independent scrutiny by the CPS, director of public prosecutions, and the House of Commons culture, media and sport committee.

"The Met has considered whether matters raised by the media or elsewhere constituted new evidence that merited further investigation. We considered then, and we remain of the view, that no new evidence has emerged to justify re-opening this inquiry. Independently, the CPS, leading counsel and the director of public prosecutions reached the same conclusion."

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o Internal inquiry dismisses 18 complaints of undue violence
o Force faces civil action over 2008 street clash

Community groups in a formerly troubled area of Manchester have warned of serious damage to relations with the local police after an investigation cleared officers of undue violence at a street fracas.

But while 18 complaints against officers were dismissed by an internal inquiry supervised by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC), the force will still face a civil action from a peace campaigner who witnessed the trouble outside Bridgewater Hall in Manchester in May 2008.

Raymond Bell, whose wife Erinma was described as a "national hero" by Gordon Brown for her work against gang violence, said: "We've waited for justice all this time, and now they are saying that it never happened."

The police said that the inquiry had been bedevilled by a lack of co-operation, because most complainants had refused to speak directly to the force's investigators.

A former chair of the Greater Manchester police authority said today that the delayed and inconclusive findings of the investigation's report, which cited a lack of clear evidence and directly contradictory accounts, "make it feel as though we have gone back 20 years".

The inquiry was conducted by the GMP's internal investigation department, managed at arm's length by the IPCC, following anger at the incident and six arrests.

Police became involved after a report of shots being fired from a car which was then traced to the Bridgewater Hall, as families were leaving a children's talent contest. Officers searching the car were surrounded by large numbers of people and called for back-up.

Accounts then differ completely, with 18 complaints about alleged over-reaction by officers, while police involved denied any abuse. The report admits that it has proved impossible to decide who was telling the truth, with CCTV and other film and photographic evidence lacking or of poor quality.

Naseem Malik, an IPCC commissioner, said: "We cannot absolve individual officers in relation to allegations of using excessive force, nor can we absolve audience members from claims they used violence and deliberate resistance against the officers.

"The simple fact is any independent evidence is of such poor quality that a definitive conclusion cannot be reached. Many of the incidents revolve around the word of an officer against the word of a complainant."

The report also accepts the damage caused by the incident and "unacceptable" delays over whether to prosecute those arrested - charges were eventually dropped - and in the providing of evidence by complainants.

Gabrielle Cox, a former Moss Side councillor and chair of the police authority in the 1980s, said: "It feels like we have gone back 20 years. The Bridgewater Hall incident undermined years of work to improve relationships between the police and the community in Moss Side.

"The report will do nothing to repair those relationships, and is likely to compound the sense of frustration and powerlessness felt by the community. The finding of 'insufficient evidence' seems to damn every enquiry into inappropriate police actions. The system of the police investigating themselves, even if under IPCC management, remains a key barrier to community confidence."

Detective Superintendent Mike Freeman, of GMP's professional standards branch, said: "Our investigation found that the policing operation surrounding this event was very carefully planned to enable it to go ahead peacefully. The problems arose when a member of the public reported that shots had been fired from a car and officers responded to search the car. This attracted a lot of attention from people leaving the event and a number of people complained about the police response."During the course of the investigation the majority of complainants have not been prepared to speak directly to us, causing significant delays and affecting our ability to gather evidence. After investigating all of the information available to us, we have not been able to substantiate any of the complaints."

The release of Tony Blair's memoir, A Journey, settled some old scores and propelled the former prime minister back into public life. One of his former ministers and author of a second volume of diaries,Decline and Fall, Chris Mullin is in the studio to discuss Blair's legacy.

Martin Kettle had the only print interview with Blair this week. He says that he found Blair as defiant as ever on questions of Iraq and the direction in which he took the Labour party.

Polly Toynbee says sections of the book will be quoted gleefully by members of the government and describes how Blair's politics have changed since 1997.

And with an extraordinary statement from the foreign secretary, William Hague, this week, the panel discusses how rumours on the blogosphere gain currency in the mainstream media.

Leave your thoughts below.

Labour leadership contender says he wants to lead 'a government not a gang'

Labour leadership hopeful David Miliband today sought to distance himself from the party feuding reignited by Tony Blair's new book, declaring that he wanted to lead "a government not a gang".

As ballot papers went out to eligible voters, Miliband sent an email to all party members in which he said he was "sick and tired" of seeing the leadership race characterised in terms of a choice between rejecting or retaining New Labour.

Instead, the shadow foreign secretary pledged to "change the way we do politics" and said he was "ready to lead".

Miliband dispatched the email to members after the publication yesterday of Blair's autobiography, which charted the former PM's deteriorating relationship with Brown.

Urging members to give him their vote, Miliband said: "I respect both Tony and Gordon deeply. But their time has passed. Their names do not appear on the leadership ballots. And now we need to stop their achievements being sidelined and their failings holding us back."

He said those who presented the Labour leadership contest as a choice between rejecting or retaining New Labour were doing a disservice to all of the candidates and to the thousands of members who have participated over the last few months.

The leadership election was about "pulling together all the talents of our party" rather than "tired old Westminster games", he said.

In a nod to the warring Blair and Brown camps during Labour's first 10 years, Miliband said: "I want to change the way we do politics. Because I want to lead a government not a gang, a movement not a machine, where honest debate can be a source of strength, not a sign of weakness."

In the book, Blair describes David Miliband as having "clear leadership qualities".

Last night, Miliband sought to distance himself from his old political patron by insisting that if he became leader, he would stick to the "Labour way" of tackling the deficit, which was to halve it over four years.

In his book, A Journey, the former prime minister issued a stark warning to the party not to drift to the left and said he believed Labour lost the general election in May because it "stopped being New Labour" under Brown's leadership.

Blair also came close to endorsing the economic strategy of the Conservative-led coalition government.

Miliband rejected the accusation that he was the "heir to Blair" when it was put to him during last night's leadership debate on Channel 4 News.

"I am my own person. I look forward to the day when Tony says he is a Milibandite rather than people asking me whether I'm a Blairite," he said.

But he added: "Whoever becomes the party leader will become the heir to Gordon Brown's leadership of the Labour party. Few people would say I was the continuity candidate with Gordon."

In what will be seen as a thinly-veiled attack on his older brother, Ed Miliband said during the debate that Blair "along with others" was stuck in a "New Labour comfort zone".

He said: "The truth is that unless we change our attitude on a whole range of things that New Labour took for granted, like flexible labour markets that mean low pay and bad working conditions for people, tuition fees and ID cards, unless we change we are not going to win again. So Tony was a great servant to us in the past, I don't think he's right about the future."

The shadow health secretary, Andy Burnham, claimed New Labour was seen as "hollow and disconnected" and said: "When Tony Blair says we don't need to move a millimetre away from New Labour I think he has not been on doorsteps recently and he has not recognised how we came to be seen."

Leftwinger Diane Abbott issued a broadside on the Blair-Brown era by saying New Labour had "frayed" some of the community ties because of its obsession with markets.

In a speech on how Labour should respond to the government's "big society" agenda, delivered today, she said: "I believe that it is time issues around family and community took centre stage in the debate about what the Labour party is for," she said.

"New Labour regarded mutual organisation and co-ops as dusty and old fashioned compared to the bright shiny world of the free markets and international financial services. But now unfettered free markets have nearly crashed the world economy, maybe it is time for the Labour party to rediscover some of those old models. They might provide appropriate structures going forward for banks like Northern Rock currently in government ownership."

As contenders bid to succeed Brown, the former premier revealed he going to work on projects including promoting global access to education and boosting internet use in Africa.

No 10 says Hague enjoys PM's full support as foreign secretary says he wanted to 'put the record straight' about his sexuality

David Cameron declared his "100% support" for William Hague today, as the foreign secretary said he had decided to speak out about his private life because he could no longer put up with allegations about his sexuality.

Hague also received the backing of his local constituency party chair after issuing a statement yesterday in which he denied having had an "improper" relationship with his special adviser, Christopher Myers, who resigned as a result of the "pressure" put on his family due to the "untrue and malicious allegations" circulating on the internet.

At a press conference this morning with the German foreign minster, Guido Westerwelle, Hague refused to be drawn on his decision to appoint Myers, or respond to the suggestion that he had exercised "poor judgment" in sharing a hotel room with his assistant.

Downing Street said today that Hague enjoyed Cameron's full support, after the foreign secretary denied having had any relationships with men and revealed details about his wife's miscarriages to dispel rumours that he had made an "improper" appointment in hiring Myers.

Government sources stressed that the statement was Hague's idea and that it was fully supported by his wife. But Andy Coulson, the Downing Street director of communications, was said to have been heavily involved.

At the press conference, Hague said: "Yesterday, I made a very personal statement, which was not an easy thing to do. I am not going to expand on that today. My wife and I really felt we had had enough of the circulation of untrue allegations, particularly on the internet, and at some point you have to speak out about that and put the record straight."

Asked to comment on a claim made by fellow Tory MP, John Redwood, that he had exercised "poor judgment" in sharing a room with his assistant, Hague insisted that the work of the Foreign Office "has not missed a beat, and will not miss a beat, at any stage. I have not spent many minutes away from all duties of the foreign secretary."

Questioned about Myers's eligibility for the job, Hague claimed this had been covered in his statement of yesterday. However, that statement made no mention of why he had given Myers the job despite already having two special advisers.

There had been unease in Downing Street at Hague's judgment in appointing a 25-year-old graduate with little apparent expertise in foreign affairs.

But asked today whether Hague continued to have the support of Cameron, a spokeswoman for the prime minister said that he was not making any new statement on the issue but had given the foreign secretary his full backing throughout.

The spokeswoman said: "We have always given William our 100% support. That was the case yesterday and it is the case today.

"The prime minister totally understands why William made the statement he did and he backs him 100%."

Ed Balls, one of the candidates for Labour leader, sympathised with the Hagues, but said he did not think making the statement was the "wisest" way to respond to the internet rumours.

Balls said that together with his wife, shadow work and pensions secretary Yvette Cooper, he had "put up with" smears and lies from rightwing blogs rather than respond publicly.

The shadow education secretary told BBC Radio 2's Jeremy Vine show: "I'm not sure whether going out and making a public statement in that detail is the wisest thing to do. I think it probably gives more credibility to some of these websites and to allegations which aren't true.

"I've no reason to think that there's anything other than complete integrity in what William Hague says and I feel sorry for him and for Ffion in going through this."

Hague's decision to issue a statement was described as "very brave" by Christopher Bourne-Arton, the chair of the Conservative Association in his North Yorkshire constituency of Richmond.

Bourne-Arton told BBC Radio 4's World at One: "Rumour has been created by somebody who makes a living out of blogging and has nothing better to do and so he had to nail it once and for all. The tragedy is that it was made necessary by this media feeding frenzy."

Hague confirmed yesterday that Myers had resigned as a result of the "pressure" put on his family due to the "untrue and malicious allegations made about him".

In his statement Hague said: "Any suggestion that his appointment was due to an improper relationship between us is utterly false, as is any suggestion that I have ever been involved in a relationship with any man."

Hague admitted to "occasionally" sharing hotel rooms with Myers during the election campaign.

But he added: "Neither of us would have done so if we had thought that it in any way meant or implied something else. In hindsight, I should have given greater consideration to what might have been made of that, but this is in itself no justification for allegations of this kind, which are untrue and deeply distressing to me, to Ffion and to Christopher."

Hague acknowledged that releasing the statement would cause "distress" for their families but insisted he had to reveal the "straightforward truth".

Myers was employed by Hague during the general election campaign as a constituency aide and had worked for the foreign secretary as a policy adviser on a salary reported to be £30,000.

Athol Fugard is right: too many playwrights are under pressure to give the audience a good night out

In Monday's Guardian, political playwright Athol Fugard voiced a concern that dramatists are "failing to confront issues of injustice, writing instead for attention spans of 10 minutes between adverts". Monday was also the first day of rehearsal for my play Ugly, which deals frankly with the issue of climate change - it's set in a future where food and water are scarce - and is the most political work I've ever done. So part of me wants to disagree with Fugard. Only, in my heart, I think he's got a point.

I don't think there is enough seriously engaged or oppositional theatre being made. But why does it feel so difficult to do political work when we're living through one of the most critical periods of human history? I suspect the answer may have something to do with a desire (of audiences and theatre-makers alike) to look for distraction rather than reflections of our frightening reality. And, I recognise an urge to self-censor, too. I found writing Ugly difficult because, while I've come to a point where I believe that the only way to confront climate change is to work for radical, systemic change, I'm fearful that by admitting this, I'll be closing my writing career down - that I'll be suspected of being too intense, and not a good laugh. I guess other writers may also sense the prevailing mood out there is: "Keep it light: if you must be informed, be ironic, and most importantly be non-committal about everything, other than the fact that paedophilia is evil." Writing Ugly became a battle against those self-censoring urges.

How to talk about issues without preaching? No audience wants to be handed a manifesto when they come to the theatre. But if political theatre doesn't produce some kind of action, what's the point? I had to remind myself that I don't have to have the answers: writing a play is about creating a drama, which in its unfolding makes space for questions. The stage is one of the few places left where it is still possible to inspire challenging and exciting conversation. Writing this play became about attempting to chew on some big questions, while hoping that I wouldn't choke during the process.

But isn't theatre about giving people a smashing night out? Shouldn't writers entertain? Is it possible to do that when you're writing a dark-as-night comedy about - among other things - a disgraced home economics teacher who survives by selling her body and her memories of the meals she once cooked, when food was not scarce? After a lot of soul-searching, I realised the answer is yes. The bar is not lower when we make political work, it is higher. Entertainment and engagement is my aim for Ugly. As for finding hope in all of this? I believe that lies with the audience. One of the things I love about working with Red Ladder theatre company is that their shows always have a forum for discussion after the performance. During these, I hope people will feel inspired to share their thoughts. I also hope that some will feel inspired enough to take those thoughts back into their lives and turn them into action. But, I have no interest in telling people what to do. For me, the show has done its job if it gets people thinking and discussing.

I think Athol Fugard has a good point, for all that he overlooks plenty of examples of provocative and political work. For writers and theatre companies everywhere, perhaps his words are a wake-up call. Not only do we need to do this work, but maybe we need to get better at letting people know about it.

Former prime minister issues statement explaining how he and his wife, Sarah, are to embark on a number of charitable projects

Gordon Brown today broke his silence to set out his plans for the future announcing that he is to embark on a number of charitable projects and will set up an Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown to coordinate his work, paid for by a string of lucrative speaking engagements.

In a move designed to rise above the furore surrounding the avalanche of criticisms contained in Tony Blair's memoirs, Brown issued a statement setting out his "priorities for the future" and how both he and his wife plan to contribute to public life in the future.

He confirmed he had spent the summer finalising his book on global economic affairs and visiting local schools, businesses and charities. He announced three new appointments: as convenor of the Global Campaign for Education working with Queen Rania of Jordan, working on a new programme to bring the internet to Africa and joining the board of Tim Berners Lee's World Wide Web Foundation.

 The statement said: "Each of these positions are pro bono and Mr Brown will not accept any remuneration.

 "He will continue to write on global issues, as he has been doing recently with articles on the desperate plight of those in Pakistan and Niger. 

"To facilitate their ongoing public policy work, the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown has been set up to employ a number of staff to work on the projects they are committed to. 

"Gordon and Sarah have always made clear they are determined to continue to make their contribution to public life and these latest initiatives are a sign of Gordon's priorities for the future."

A spokesman confirmed Brown has put his name on the books of the Washington Speeches Bureau in order to fund the salaries of his staff, which has been cleared by the advisory committee on business appointments.

The former prime minister wearing a poppy in Jonathan Yeo's portrait was no coincidence. It was the first step in a deliberate plan to influence his political legacy

In January 2008, a portrait of Tony Blair by Jonathan Yeo was unveiled in which the former prime minister wore a poppy. Reviewing it for the Guardian, I was skeptical about the notion that, somehow, the artist had subversively caught his subject off guard or conned him into wearing this unmistakable reminder of the wars that have bloodied his reputation. Blair is an experienced manipulator of his own image, I opined: if he wears a poppy it is because he wants it that way. Would Blair, I wondered, one day find the words to match this apparently guilt-stricken image?

Well, here come 700 pages of them. The quotations already published from his book, and the reactions to it, should remind us that Blair is one of the most virtuous - in Machiavelli's sense of the word, meaning effective - politicians of modern times. On the front page of yesterday's Daily Mail, a photograph homed in on Blair's eyes. Making them look icy, it seemed to unconsciously ape the "Demon Eyes" poster the Tories used against Blair in the 1997 election, in which he is portrayed with a gash cut through his face to reveal the devil within. The interesting thing about this visual echo is that the Tory campaign poster failed to damage Blair, back in the day.

Words and images match - the Mail front page headline attacking Blair's "crocodile tears" seems hysterical and forced. The fact is Blair, in the quotes published from his memoir underneath the picture, sounds like someone who knows the enormity of ordering soldiers to die in a war. They are dead and he is alive. He knows that. At least admit these are articulate words: "I feel words of condolence and sympathy to be entirely inadequate. They have died, and I, the decision-maker in the circumstances that led to their deaths, still live". Where is the comparable quote from Margaret Thatcher about the Falklands, from Lyndon B Johnson about Vietnam, or even from president Obama about Afghanistan?

I have no idea if Blair means these words, if his charitable gesture is sincere or tactical, if he really loses sleep, or if it makes a difference that he does. But Blair is remaking his own image faster than critics can deface it. I think you could already see, in Blair's decision to wear a poppy for his portrait two years ago, how he was going to get to grips with history.

Tony Blair's achievements may be undervalued in Britain, but his role in our independence makes him a political giant in Kosovo

"The king is dead, long live the king" is an expression about monarchy, but it rings true in modern democracy. Some in Britain appear to have forgotten that Tony Blair led their country on the world stage for 10 years and that moreover, that they gave him a large mandate to do so on three occasions. As the prime minister of Europe's youngest country, I have been fortunate in feeling the UK's unshaken support under the governments that have succeeded Blair, both Gordon Brown and David Cameron. But, on a personal basis, I cannot help feeling that Blair's own extraordinary energy and considerable achievements are now being undervalued at home.

Given the tremendous role that Blair played in helping my country forge its independence, I hope his book will not only bring a personal perspective to some important global events but remind people why they admired the man in the first place. Political power is not really aggrandising at all. There is something deeply humbling about public service and the trust that a nation places in the individuals it charges to lead. Blair knows this. Meanwhile, as Kosovo seeks to consolidate its position on the European stage, Tony Blair's conduct and commitment is a powerful example to me personally - and all of us in Kosovo owe him and British people a considerable debt.

Although we declared independence two years ago, it was only last month (22 July) that the international court of justice finally ratified Kosovo as a sovereign, independent state. The decisive 10 to four majority concluded that our declaration did not violate international law or UN security council resolution 1244, nor did it compromise the constitutional framework established by the UN to guide the interim stabilisation of Kosovo. Crucially, the court reaffirmed Kosovo's place in the international community, something which 69 countries have already recognised.

Since we need more recognitions to achieve our seat at the UN general assembly, I am calling on those states that have not yet done so to recognise Kosovo. I am grateful to the current British government for its constructive efforts in allowing Kosovo to take its place among other nations. In addition, Tony Blair is making similar representations to the same countries on our behalf.

Kosovans did not arrive at the decision to declare independence lightly, or by default through political vacuum. Indeed, as the ICJ acknowledged, the circumstances that led to Kosovo's declaration of independence were unique. The narrowness of the court's ruling on this issue should reassure any country reluctant to recognise Kosovo to date. Our declaration did not set a precedent, and any suggestions that the court's ruling opens a Pandora's box are wrong. Countries still opposing our sovereignty, typically because of secessionist concerns within their own borders, should accept this.

Today's Serbian government has a different complexion from the one that terrorised my people 11 years ago. All the same, some influential elements within it are still trying to pick holes in the ICJ's decision, hoping to open another UN general assembly resolution to contest Kosovo's status. The legal question about Kosovo's independence was asked and the court's answer was unambiguous. The Serbian government may not have liked the answer it received from the court, but if it maintains aspirations of its own to be part of the greater European family, it must surely accept the rule of law.

Frankly, Kosovars see the ruling as an opportunity to put the past behind us and move forward with all the countries of the Balkans, including Serbia, towards true Euro-Atlantic integration. My country looks forward to working with Serbia and discussing practical issues that would improve the lives of all of our citizens. We are neighbours and we face common challenges. Our police forces must work together to combat the ravages of international crime. Our two countries need to co-operate on practical issues such as energy, telecommunications, and education. We have a common interest in working together to identify the fate of missing persons - both Albanian and Serb - from the sad period of the war we both experienced.

Our Serbian neighbours may not recognise Kosovo's independence just yet, but co-operation between the two independent states is inevitable. Meanwhile Kosovo will continue to build on the firm foundations it has laid since 2008. We will complete implementation of the Ahtisaari plan - now enshrined in our new constitution - with its far-reaching guarantees for a secular society that protects the rights of members of all ethnic groups in Kosovo, including Serbs. We will continue to strengthen our democratic institutions and we will take the decisions necessary to promote long-term, private sector-led economic growth.

There is much to do, but Kosovo is already open for investment, business and tourism. As Tony Blair declared in his speech to our parliament in July: "There is a dream for you now. That one day, Kosovo takes its place as a member of the European Union, a proud independent state, not just directing its own affairs, but playing its part in those of the largest political and commercial union in the world."

Yes, Kosovo will continue the reforms necessary to secure its rightful place in the UN, in Nato and the EU, and we are delighted that Mr Blair continues to champion our cause. His role in Kosovo's history will be recognised as an important example in a great legacy. Kosovo has honoured him with the Golden Medal of Freedom, and Kosovans will forever remember him as one of their heroes.

Polly Curtis explains the role of the confidants and spinners at the heart of government

Industrial action on London Underground to start on 6 September in protest against plans to cut 800 jobs

Talks aimed at averting a series of strikes by London Underground workers from next week have broken down and the industrial action will go ahead as planned, union leaders said today.

The Rail Maritime and Transport (RMT) union said LU had failed to remove the threat of cuts to safety and safe staffing levels that would have allowed "meaningful discussions" to take place.

Thousands of Tube staff are due to launch the walkouts from next Monday evening, 6 September, in protest against plans to cut 800 jobs, threatening travel chaos in the capital.

The RMT accused LU management of "sabotaging" talks today at the conciliation service Acas with officials from the union, and the Transport Salaried Staffs Association.

The RMT's general secretary, Bob Crow, said: "LU management knew very well that meaningful talks could not proceed while the threat of cuts to safety and safe staffing levels hung over our members' heads - their failure to remove that threat sabotaged any prospect of making progress.

"RMT and TSSA negotiators completely demolished the LU line that the cuts are simply about new technology and the Oyster card. The planned cuts are part of a multibillion black hole facing the mayor due to the costs of the failure of Tube privatisation and an attack on funding levels from the ConDem government.

"Not only are ticket offices and ticket staff jobs threatened but hundreds of other station staff posts are also on the line. It was the presence of those very staff that averted potential disaster in recent incidents involving fires at Euston and Oxford Circus.

"RMT and TSSA have been presented with a stark choice. We could sit back and wait for a major disaster while safety cuts are bulldozed through, turning the Tube into a death trap, or we can stand up and fight for passenger and staff safety.

"On Monday we will be making a stand on safety and safe staffing levels on behalf of all Londoners."

Myers was appointed on 24 May but the official list naming all special advisers and their salary brackets did not include his name when it was published on 10 June

Downing Street failed to include the aide who has been at the centre of the row over William Hague's private life when it published an official list of special advisers in June designed to demonstrate how the coalition was cutting back on political appointments.

Hague's office today confirmed that Myers, who yesterday quit citing the pressure of speculation surrounding the nature of his relationship with the foreign secretary, was appointed on 24 May. But the official list naming all special advisers and their salary brackets did not include Myers when it was published on 10 June.

The cabinet office said that Myers's name was not included because although he had been appointed, he had not started the job by 10 June.

Hague spoke out as David Cameron's office confirmed that the prime minister had full confidence in his foreign secretary. Hague said he had made yesterday's "very personal statement", in which he denied allegations that he was gay, that his marriage was in trouble and that he was romantically linked to Myers, in order to end the speculation over his private life.

The statement also revealed that he and his wife Ffion had suffered a series of miscarriages. However, that statement - including the admission that he and Myers had shared twin bedrooms during the election campaign - drew new criticisms from Tory colleagues who questioned his judgment.

Hague told a Foreign Office press conference today: "Yesterday, I made a very personal statement, which was not an easy thing to do. I am not going to expand on that today. My wife and I really felt we had had enough of the circulation of untrue allegations, particularly on the internet, and at some point you have to speak out about that and put the record straight."

Asked about his colleague John Redwood's suggestion that Hague himself now acknowledged he had exercised "poor judgment" in sharing a room with his assistant, Hague said that his work "has not missed a beat, and will not miss a beat, at any stage. I have not spent many minutes away from all duties of the foreign secretary."

Lord Tebbit, the former Tory minister, said that Hague had been "naive at best, foolish at worst".

Redwood wrote on his blog: "His [Hague's] statement confirms that he has shared hotel rooms with a young male assistant, and argues that this assistant was well qualified to become a special adviser to the Foreign Office. Mr Hague has now accepted the resignation of this special adviser, Mr Myers. Mr Hague tells us he did not have an inappropriate relationship with this young man.

"Let us hope this is now an end to the matter. Mr Hague himself now seems to believe that it was poor judgement to share a hotel room with an assistant."

Hague was forced to issue yesterday's extraordinarily personal and detailed statement yesterday under mounting pressure from reports in political blogs and investigations by newspapers over the past few weeks speculating about the appointment of the 25-year old graduate.

Press Complaints Commission confirms it was told two months ago that journalist was under investigation over new claim

The News of the World is facing a fresh allegation of phone hacking against one of its journalists, the Press Complaints Commission confirmed today.

The commission was informed by the paper just over two months ago about the allegation, and the journalist involved has been "suspended from reporting duties".

Stephen Abell, the PCC director, confirmed today that the press regulator was informed in by the paper in June "of the existence of the recent allegation of phone-message hacking against the reporter". Abell said that the PCC was prevented from launching its own investigation because the allegation was "the subject of legal action".

The new claim was revealed late yesterday in a New York Times article on the News of the World phone-hacking affair. The paper reported that the News of the World was conducting a new phone-hacking investigation and had suspended a reporter, after a "television personality" had been alerted by her phone company to a "possible unauthorised attempt to access her voicemail" and the number was traced back to a journalist at the paper.

Bill Akass, the News of the World managing editor, confirmed in a response to the New York Times that an internal investigation was under way and that a journalist had been "suspended from reporting duties".

It is understood that the News of the World was first made aware of the phone-hacking claim around Easter this year and that the internal investigation is ongoing.

"A serious allegation has been made about the conduct of one of our reporters. We have followed our internal procedures and the reporter has been suspended from reporting duties, and a very thorough and extensive investigation carried out into that allegation (involving, for example, external forensic specialists)," Akass said.

"The allegation is the subject of litigation and our internal investigation continues in tandem with that, which means I am unable to comment further. If the conclusion of the investigation or the litigation is that the allegation is proven, the reporter will be dismissed for gross misconduct without compensation.

"We have a zero-tolerance approach to any wrong-doing and will take swift and decisive action if we have proof of any wrong-doing."

Abell said: "The PCC was informed by the News of the World in June of the existence of the recent allegation of phone message hacking against the reporter. This is currently the subject of legal action, which has prevented the PCC from becoming formally involved at this stage.

"However, once the legal action has been concluded, the commission will consider the matter further. It was right that the News of the World disclosed the existence of this claim to the PCC, and we will address the issues when it is possible for us to do so. The PCC has made publicly clear on a number of occasions that phone message hacking is deplorable and that view - of course - remains."

The News of the World's editor, Colin Myler told the Commons culture select committee last year that he had introduced new procedures to avoid a repeat of this behaviour. Myler became editor in 2007, when Andy Coulson resigned over the Clive Goodman phone-hacking affair.

Myler told the committee that all staff were ordered to follow the PCC code of conduct and warned that failure to comply could result in disciplinary proceedings. Stricter controls on cash payments and sources were also introduced and all staff had to attend workshops on the PCC code, he added.

The committee called several current and former executives from the News of the World's publisher, News International, including Coulson, last year as part of its inquiry into privacy, press standards and libel.

This fresh round of hearings was prompted by the Guardian's revelation that News International had paid £700,000 to settle a breach of privacy claim from Gordon Taylor, chief executive of the Professional Footballers' Association, after a private investigator working for the News of the World hacked into his phone.

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Downing Street and Cabinet Office unable to explain omission of man at centre of allegations over foreign secretary's private life

Downing Street failed to include the aide who has been at the centre of the row over William Hague's private life when it published an official list of special advisers in June designed to demonstrate how the coalition was cutting back on political appointments.

Hague's office today confirmed that Myers, who yesterday quit citing the pressure of speculation surrounding the nature of his relationship with the foreign secretary, was appointed on 24 May. But the official list naming all special advisers and their salary brackets did not include Myers when it was published on 10 June.

The disclosure that his name was not included will raise new questions about whether his appointment was official, or whether the list, hailed as a sign that the coalition was cracking down on spin in government, was incomplete. Downing Street and the Cabinet Office could not immediately explain the omission.

Hague spoke out as David Cameron's office confirmed that the prime minister had full confidence in his foreign secretary. Hague said he had made yesterday's "very personal statement", in which he denied allegations that he was gay, that his marriage was in trouble and that he was romantically linked to Myers, in order to end the speculation over his private life.

The statement also revealed that he and his wife Ffion had suffered a series of miscarriages. However, that statement - including the admission that he and Myers had shared twin bedrooms during the election campaign - drew new criticisms from Tory colleagues who questioned his judgment.

Hague told a Foreign Office press conference today: "Yesterday, I made a very personal statement, which was not an easy thing to do. I am not going to expand on that today. My wife and I really felt we had had enough of the circulation of untrue allegations, particularly on the internet, and at some point you have to speak out about that and put the record straight."

Asked about his colleague John Redwood's suggestion that Hague himself now acknowledged he had exercised "poor judgment" in sharing a room with his assistant, Hague said that his work "has not missed a beat, and will not miss a beat, at any stage. I have not spent many minutes away from all duties of the foreign secretary."

Lord Tebbit, the former Tory minister, said that Hague had been "naive at best, foolish at worst".

Redwood wrote on his blog: "His [Hague's] statement confirms that he has shared hotel rooms with a young male assistant, and argues that this assistant was well qualified to become a special adviser to the Foreign Office. Mr Hague has now accepted the resignation of this special adviser, Mr Myers. Mr Hague tells us he did not have an inappropriate relationship with this young man.

"Let us hope this is now an end to the matter. Mr Hague himself now seems to believe that it was poor judgement to share a hotel room with an assistant."

Hague was forced to issue yesterday's extraordinarily personal and detailed statement yesterday under mounting pressure from reports in political blogs and investigations by newspapers over the past few weeks speculating about the appointment of the 25-year old graduate.

The Scottish government wants to set a 45p-a-unit minimum price for alcohol. Is this the way to tackle excessive drinking?

How much should you pay to drink a little too much? The Scottish government has just proposed a minimum price of 45p for one alcohol unit in an effort to curb excessive alcohol consumption.

The move is the latest in an attempt to tackle Scotland's dangerous levels of drinking: a study in January found that adults in Scotland were drinking the equivalent of 46 bottles of vodka a year each, 25% more than people in Wales or England. The government claims that the plan would save the Scottish NHS £5.5m every year.

Opposition parties at Holyrood have criticised the proposal, saying that it would unfairly affect responsible drinkers. What do you think? Would increasing the price of alcohol make you less likely to drink? Is this an appropriate job for government? And why does Britain - and especially Scotland - have a problem with excessive drinking in the first place?

Former Tory leadership contender who fell out with foreign secretary over Welsh language row becomes most senior Tory to speak out about Hague's current troubles

John Redwood, the former cabinet minister and failed Tory leadership contender, became the most senior Conservative to criticise William Hague today.

On his blog, which usually covers weighty economic matters, Redwood said Hague had shown "poor judgment" in sharing a hotel room with his former special adviser, Christopher Myers.

This is what Redwood wrote:

His statement confirms that he has shared hotel rooms with a young male assistant, and argues that this assistant was well qualified to become a special adviser to the Foreign Office. Mr Hague has now accepted the resignation of this special adviser, Mr Myers. Mr Hague tells us he did not have an inappropriate relationship with this young man.

Let us hope this is now an end to the matter. Mr Hague himself now seems to believe that it was poor judgement to share a hotel room with an assistant.

Redwood then returns to high policy matters as he concludes his blog saying that the "bigger issue of judgment" for Hague is how he handles the EU.

How does he intend to win over Euroceptics to his tenure at the Foreign Office?

Redwood is reflecting the widespread feeling in the Tory party that Hague once again made an error of judgment when he appointed a 25 year old with little knowledge of foreign affairs as a special adviser.

But there is history here. Hague replaced Redwood as Welsh secretary in 1995 when the latter resigned from the cabinet to challenge John Major for the Tory leadership after the former prime minister's "put up or shut up" challenge to the Eurosceptic right.

Redwood's worst moment as Welsh secretary came when he was filmed struggling to keep up with the Welsh national anthem. The footage emerged during the 1995 the leadership contest.

Here it is in its full glory:

Hague made sure that he was not caught out in the same way. He took Welsh lessons with a bright young civil servant, Ffion Jenkins. She is now his wife.

Foreign secretary responds to rumours about his personal life

David Miliband's reluctance to repudiate a single major New Labour policy indicates an unwillingness to move on

Until this May I had lived my entire adult life under a Labour government. I remember though how difficult things were in my community under the Tories, out in the last reaches of east London. Many people in my generation have seen, and benefited from, the investment in education, health, and public services that Labour undertook, which breathed life back into them after the wilful neglect of the last Conservative government. It is also my generation that was politicised and mobilised on a national scale to oppose tuition fees, the Iraq war, civil liberties clamp-downs, and climate change. We are uniquely placed as both the beneficiaries and - when necessary - the fiercest critics of the New Labour project.

Leading the Labour party's youth movement, now numbering over 20,000 members, I've been watching, listening, and debating with party colleagues from across the spectrum about this leadership election. Until now I have refrained from entering the fray publicly, so that Young Labour can secure the reforms we need to resource, train, recruit and organise activists across the country - whatever the outcome.

As an advocate of community organising, I've been heartened to see a recognition from David Miliband and others that Labour needs to become a movement - living, breathing, fighting, and organising in communities up and down the country. But this organising must be more than a nod to communitarianism - it has to be based on the right philosophy and programme or it will be worthless.

I've been compelled by the evidence of where our electoral coalition has broken down. This has been neatly put forward by Andy Burnham in his attacks on "metropolitan elites", Ed Balls robustly attacking the coalition on education and the economy, and Diane Abbott calling for a focus on the poor and underprivileged. The electoral analysis shows that in communities such as mine, where for a while the BNP was setting the political discourse, and in other working-class areas, our support and trust has been dramatically eroded.

The results across the country, even in marginal seats, demonstrated quite starkly that we cannot let the argument win out that if we try to reconnect with our natural supporters we will lose our middle-class vote. It is not a zero-sum game. What is clear though, is that New Labour took ordinary working people for granted for too long. We cannot lose another election in a New Labour comfort zone, as some relics from a past era have said in the last few days. We will not go back to the 80s, nor can we go back to the triangulation of the 90s.

So at a time when there is widespread recognition in society that the needs of ordinary people must be put before the needs of the market, David Miliband's reluctance to repudiate a single significant policy decision from the New Labour era is indicative of an unwillingness to move to a future beyond it, a future that many in Young Labour and the wider party have already seen. It will not lead to the creation of the "good society". It is because of this that I believe that Jon Cruddas, my closest political mentor has called it wrong; it runs counter to his own "Choose change" deputy leadership campaign in 2007 and to the body of work and support in the party he has built.

I believe that there is only one candidate who can build the cross-class alliance necessary to win an election, heal the wounds of mistakes made whilst in government, rebuild a new covenant with the British people and move from continuity to the real change our party needs in terms of culture, policy, and organisation, whilst being willing to listen and to work across the party to deliver this. I believe that person is Ed Miliband.

Whether it is campaigning for the living wage, a high pay commission, a graduate tax, a new green and political economy - as part of a bold vision of the good society, it is Ed Miliband who has recognised this movement and demonstrated his future vision based upon it. To reject this movement - which has been building steadily within the party - is to opt for continuity over real change.

Tony Blair Interview with Andrew Marr about former prime minister's memoirs A Journey attract 9.5% audience share

Andrew Marr's interview with Tony Blair about his memoir A Journey attracted just under 2 million viewers on BBC2 last night, Wednesday 1 September.

The Tony Blair Interview with Andrew Marr was watched by 1.78 million viewers and attracted a 9.5% audience share from 7pm.

Marr's encounter with Blair was head to head with the Channel 4 News Labour leadership debate, with the five candidates questioned in the studio by presenter Jon Snow.

Channel 4 News was watched by 539,000 (2.9%), with a further 55,000 (0.3%) on Channel 4 +1.

Last Wednesday a repeat of natural history documentary Mountain Gorilla had 1.625 million (8%) in the 7pm hour on BBC2, while Channel 4 News attracted 836,000 (4.2%, C4 +1 50,000/0.2%).

ITV1/ITV1 HD's Emmerdale won the 7pm slot as usual, attracting 6.463 million (34.7%), while The One Show had 3.38 million (18.2%) on BBC1/BBC HD. Channel 5's 7pm Five News bulletin was watched by 189,000 (1%).

BBC1, BBC2, ITV1, Channel 4, Channel Five (available in all UK homes with TV, except Channel 5, which reaches about 95%)

BBC1

8pm: Waterloo Road (new series) - 4.97 million/22.8%, BBC HD 79,000/0.4%

BBC2

9pm: Alex Higgins: the People's Champion - 2.72 million/12.1%

ITV1/ITV1 HD

9pm: Agatha Christie's Poirot (rpt) - 2.863 million/12.9%

Channel 4

10pm: Ultimate Big Brother - 2.526 million/14.6%, C4+1 183,000/2%

Channel 5

8pm: Emergency Bikers - 896,000/4.1%

o To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000.

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No 10 says Hague enjoys PM's full support as foreign secretary says he wanted to 'put the record straight' about his sexuality

David Cameron declared his "100% support" for William Hague today, as the foreign secretary said he had decided to speak out about his private life because he could no longer put up with allegations about his sexuality.

Hague yesterday denied having had an "improper" relationship with his special adviser Christopher Myers, who resigned as a result of the "pressure" put on his family due to the "untrue and malicious allegations" circulating on the internet.

At a press conference with the German foreign minster, Guido Westerwelle, Hague refused to be drawn on his decision to appoint Myers in the first place, or respond to the suggestion that he had exercised "poor judgment" in sharing a hotel room with his assistant.

Downing Street said today that Hague enjoyed Cameron's full support, after the foreign secretary denied having any relationships with men and revealed details about his wife's miscarriages to dispel rumours that he had made an "improper" appointment in hiring Myers.

Government sources stressed that the statement was Hague's idea and that it was fully supported by his wife. But Andy Coulson, the Downing Street director of communications, was said to have been heavily involved.

At the press conference, Hague said: "Yesterday, I made a very personal statement, which was not an easy thing to do. I am not going to expand on that today. My wife and I really felt we had had enough of the circulation of untrue allegations, particularly on the internet, and at some point you have to speak out about that and put the record straight."

Asked to comment on a claim made by fellow Tory MP, John Redwood, that he had exercised "poor judgment" in sharing a room with his assistant, Hague insisted that the work of the Foreign Office "has not missed a beat, and will not miss a beat, at any stage. I have not spent many minutes away from all duties of the foreign secretary."

Questioned about Myers's eligibility for the job, Hague claimed this had been covered in his statement of yesterday. However, the foreign secretary's statement made no mention of why he had given Myers the job despite already having two special advisers.

There had been unease in Downing Street at Hague's judgment in appointing a 25-year-old graduate with little apparent expertise in foreign affairs.

But asked today whether Hague continued to have the support of Cameron, a spokeswoman for the prime minister said that he was not making any new statement on the issue but had given the foreign secretary his full backing throughout.

The spokeswoman said: "We have always given William our 100% support. That was the case yesterday and it is the case today.

"The prime minister totally understands why William made the statement he did and he backs him 100%."

Hague confirmed yesterday that Myers had resigned as a result of the "pressure" put on his family due to the "untrue and malicious allegations made about him".

In his statement Hague said: "Any suggestion that his appointment was due to an improper relationship between us is utterly false, as is any suggestion that I have ever been involved in a relationship with any man."

Hague admitted to "occasionally" sharing hotel rooms with Myers during the election campaign.

But he added: "Neither of us would have done so if we had thought that it in any way meant or implied something else. In hindsight, I should have given greater consideration to what might have been made of that, but this is in itself no justification for allegations of this kind, which are untrue and deeply distressing to me, to Ffion and to Christopher."

Hague acknowledged that releasing the statement would cause "distress" for their families but insisted he had to reveal the "straightforward truth".

Myers was employed by Hague during the general election campaign as a constituency aide and had worked for the foreign secretary as a policy adviser on a salary reported to be £30,000.

David Cameron promised an uncompromising clampdown on benefit fraud, but what does this actually mean for communities?

We are told that Mr Cameron is 'waging war on benefit cheats'. Currently that seems to mean attacking people like Ms X. In her 50s, caring for her adult daughter, she worked all her life until made redundant. Now with a physical impairment and life limiting condition, following one of the Department of Work and Pension's own medical assessments, she has had her Employment Support Allowance (ESA) stopped and can expect to lose her housing benefit.

While Mr Cameron wages war on her, the rest of us may wonder exactly which employers will be rushing forward to take her on. Meanwhile Mad Pride the mental health service users' organisation is planning a campaign and day of action next month under the banner of Stop The Suicides - Hands Off Our Benefits, so fearful are they of the effects of this new war on poor and powerless people.

Perhaps the greatest irony of all though is that in its plans for welfare reform, our current coalition government does not seem to have learned lessons the folly of vicious attacks on welfare claimants recognised well over a century ago by the Victorian Poor Law, the modern byword for cruel and vindictive welfare regimes.

Then there were massive middle class fears about the improvidence and thriftlessness of the poor, 'able-bodied paupers', 'clever beggars' and 'the residuum', were seen as a degraded force whose 'demoralisation' posed a threat to civilisation, social order and even the gene pool. Charitably supported free dispensaries and free outpatient treatment by London hospitals were condemned for holding up the development of 'provident' habits.

What we can learn from the Victorians, which we are currently witnessing again with medical testing for disability and other benefits, is that you can manipulate the scale of problems by the severity of the eligibility tests you apply. The Victorians did this with the notorious 'workhouse test' - a draconian routine that paupers had to go through to receive any support.

The tests included stone breaking or oakum picking. Stone breaking meant you had to break a certain amount of stones with no tools over a spike. Oakum picking involved unpicking tar from old rope with your bare hands.

Yet at the height of this Victorian paranoia, a poor law report on the 'casual poor', homeless people - one of the most vilified groups - concluded that making conditions more severe actually had the opposite effect to that intended. The 'hardcore' offenders it was intended to exclude, remained unfazed by the harsher workhouse test, stigma and humiliation. The latter meant nothing to them, while their familiarity with the system meant that they could readily undertake the tasks demanded of them. The people who were most penalised and deterred were not the undeserving poor but those the system actually saw as deserving support. They would do anything to escape the humiliation and cruelty.

Stereotypes at the level of little Britain's wheelchair using Andy Pipkin seem to underpin the current government's moral panic about welfare reform. They are likely to have the same destructive effects as their Victorian predecessors. Instead of saving money, they are only likely to damage lives and communities and undermine our self-image as a civilised society.

o Peter Beresford is professor of social policy at Brunel University.

Words in the blogosphere are powerful things, as the William Hague case shows. We must learn to self-police this new world

I have a very good friend, called Ben, like me a Hackneyite. What we do is this: every six months or so we meet in a scuzzy pub in the middle of an afternoon, like schoolboys skiving off double maths, and we get very drunk on cheap white wine, and laugh at the various absurdities of modern life.

Now, I am (visibly) gay and Ben is happily married with children; but I sometimes see, from the corner of my eye, how the other drinkers are looking at us. Not with malice, nothing like that, just a quick flash of recognition: oh look at those two gay blokes, they're having a good time. But I'm wondering, in the light of recent events, what would happen to our friendship were I ever to have achieved my ambition of fighting a seat and becoming a member of parliament?

Worse - Ben is a skilled, professional writer - what would happen if I'd ever suggested to my party that we employ him to produce election literature for us? And then were seen, by a blogger, emptying a bottle of wine down our throats and laughing together in easy companionship? You don't need to imagine what the people who comment on political blogs would write - you just have to have a strong stomach, and take a look at the remarks posted on Guido Fawkes website under his articles about William Hague.

OK, so I'm a wannabe candidate, and not the foreign secretary. No one is interested in what I do. My point, though, is that due to the rise of the blogosphere, should anyone take an interest in you, they have the power to spread their thoughts about you more rapidly, with fewer sanctions, to a wider audience, than at any previous time in history. Transparency is a good thing, and the public has a right to know what elected representatives do with public money. (In the past, Guido has served the public good by writing stories the mainstream media wouldn't touch.) But when the accusations are groundless, as the ones about William Hague are, damage is done to a person's reputation so casually, so easily, that we should consider the implications of the new information environment we inhabit.

I don't think it's an overstatement to say we are living through the end of privacy. In 20 years' time I reckon that the social norm will be to have every aspect of our lives in the public domain, and I find this frightening. Those of us who grew up in the cold war, with Orwell as our political guide, can be struck by the absurdity of some of this new era's manifestations: Big Brother doesn't need to impose telescreens on us - rather he has to fight off the applicants who want to display their every movement on television. He doesn't need a secret police to rifle surreptitiously through our locked diaries - we post them online for everyone to read. We measure our success as social beings by the number of citizens who want to read our thoughts.

Big Brother and Twitter are voluntary - for now. But suppose you want to keep something private? If you are in "public life" (as MPs are, though, of course, as we all are to some extent) then you are not permitted this freedom anymore. All someone has to do is speculate: Politician X suffers from depression, for example - and politician X finds himself in the impossible position of not being able to prove a negative, or, worse, having to confirm a story that is no one's business but his own and his physician's. You might not care about politicians. But suppose someone wrote this about you: S/he doesn't pull his/her weight in this office on your internal company website. Isn't your interaction with office colleagues a "public life"? Don't your colleagues have the right to discuss you?

The media will not wind back to a 1950s deference, thank goodness. We should be aware, though, of the implications - for all of us - that the new social norm is to share everything, at all times, with everybody - and that a failure so to do will be taken by many as a sign of something wicked being hidden.

My best hope is that we develop a corresponding sense of responsibility to self-police this new world. (The idea of legislative standards for blogs strikes me as simultaneously illiberal and fatuously impractical.) Words are real things with power in the universe, no matter what your parents taught you about sticks and stones. Bloggers should consider the impact of their words on the real human beings they are describing, and realise that they share at least some of the moral responsibility for the comments which they allow their readers to publish.

Andy Burnham's radical idea could replace council tax, stamp duty and inheritance tax, and raise more than all three combined

Labour leadership hopeful Andy Burnham provoked a minor storm on Cif last week with his proposal to introduce a land value tax (LVT). This was unsurprising - introducing LVT would be the most radical change to the tax system in a generation. But some of the comments need closer examination. This is a complex issue, and the benefits of a Burnham-style LVT are not immediately obvious. So what are the potential problems and benefits, how can they be overcome, and why abolish council tax, stamp duty and inheritance tax?

The case for abolishing council tax (CT) is easy. Council tax is an unfair tax that disproportionately hits the poor. A person living in a property worth £100,000 pays around 40% of the tax paid by someone owning a property worth £1m. This is palpably unjust. Taxation should be proportionate and based on the ability to pay. CT utterly fails these tests. We all know that the CT bands are a farce. Indeed, there has been no UK-wide revaluation since CT was introduced in 1991, because it is so unpopular, and politicians are well aware that average house values have more than trebled since then.

Stamp duty is also a regressive tax. It sets arbitrary bands - for example, if your house goes £1 over the £124,999 threshold you are immediately liable to pay £1,250, while hitting the £250,000 threshold subjects you to over £5,000 extra tax. It is a tax on transactions and, for young families and individuals without access to the Bank of Mum and Dad, a huge hurdle to getting on to the property ladder.

It is much fairer and more efficient to tax the value of land and property rather than transactions on it. Taxing transactions creates bubbles in the property market and leads to price volatility (as the crisis has shown us), something we should look to tackle in order to avoid a future property-based recession

The case for removing inheritance tax (IHT) is more difficult. Some who commented on Andy Burnham's article said they could not support abolishing a tax as morally justified as IHT. Back in June, I called for the coalition to increase IHT rates to 50% and to drop the threshold at which it starts to be paid. To me, inheritance is unearned income and I have always supported taxing it. But we (me included) have to face the facts that IHT is subject to massive avoidance, as the extremely rich have the means, and numerous methods, to avoid paying it. It only raises £3bn per year. What is the point in having a tax we can't police and which is so easy to dodge?

By contrast, LVT is impossible to avoid. Since it also proportionate - Mr Burnham's proposal would see the 130,000 households worth over £1m paying well over double their current annual CT bill - it hits the rich and would give those who struggle to pay penal CT bills, a sizable tax cut.

And don't forget that while LVT doesn't directly tax inherited estates, the inheritors would either pay capital gains tax if they sold the estate, or higher LVT if they held on to it. So for the rich, there is no way to avoid paying their share.

Of course, some comments rightly noted that forms of land taxation have been tried, unsuccessfully, since the second world war. But the key difference is that previous attempts were to get windfall gains from development projects on land. Burnham's proposal, it seems to me, is to have an annual levy regardless of the use of the land or development on it.

LVT has huge potential benefits for local councils. There are currently 700,000 vacant properties in the UK. Introducing LVT would be a massive incentive for local councils to make these properties fit to live in and find tenants and buyers, since otherwise they would be wasting millions of pounds. Moreover, it would also encourage businesses to locate in less prosperous regions, as the market value of land would be much lower than in prosperous regions.

Meanwhile, some worried about the effects of LVT on the "asset rich-cash poor", particularly pensioners. To me the solution is simple: a deferral system that means that inheritors pay the LVT on death, or family member(s) help pay the bills of their relatives.

While other leadership candidates have talked about wealth taxes and bank levies, Burnham is going many steps further. The beauty of LVT is its simplicity, efficiency and fairness. It could replace council tax, stamp duty and inheritance tax, and raise more revenue than all of them combined. It's an irresistible combination and Burnham's boldness is a sign that Labour is getting it right on tax again.

But the foreign secretary does not come out of this controversy too well either

Oh dear, what a shaming day for Fleet Street and the wider media world of telly which takes its cue from tabloidland and squalid tabloid values. I cringed when I realised that William Hague had been forced to issue a humiliating personal statement about his wife's fertility to prove he was not carrying on with a male member of his staff.

How did this come about? Chiefly because the rightwing blogger Guido Fawkes (Paul Staines) got it into his head that the foreign secretary's appointment of 25-year-old Chris Myers as a special adviser must have more to it than meets the smutty eye. Some people are just like that.

What gave the story legs - as we say in the trade - was an absurdly undignified photo of Hague walking along the Embankment - near the Foreign Office in Whitehall - in casual gear. It surfaced in the Mail on Sunday, which is like the Daily Mail, but without its sense of delicacy, reticence and moral consistency.

Hague was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, plus a version of that baseball cap that undermined his leadership of the Tory party. Oh yes, and wrap-around shades. It was a ridiculous photo and Hague looked a prat: people his age (49) should not dress as if they are 25 (though occasionally we all do), especially if they are foreign secretary.

Except that Hague wasn't. The photo was a year old, not that the papers that reprinted it pointed that out. I must admit, it made me laugh. I always used to say: "Hague will be better when he's older and has grey hair." But his severing of the Tory links with the European People's party (EPP) struck me as both cynical and foolish - done for internal party tactics - so I went off him. Luckily David Cameron is proving wiser on Europe now he is in office.

Anyway, Guido kept banging away and some of the papers "started digging", as we also say in the trade. Why had Hague been allowed to appoint an inexperienced third special adviser when Dave had (unwisely; he'll learn) capped their number at two per department? What expertise did young Myers have? Better still, was it true that Hague and Myers had shared a room occasionally during the election campaign?

It's all belatedly set out in today's Guardian. But the gossip had been doing the Westminster rounds for most of August and the FO issued a less-than-watertight statement that allowed several papers - I saw it in the Daily Mail and Times yesterday - to run denial stories.

Hague has been a target for lurid gossip for decades, some of the anecdotes damning and specific, but also improbable. Do you see Ffion Hague as the sort of woman who would agree to be a beard for a sort-of-gay husband's ambition?

I don't, but perhaps it's me who's naive. A Yorkshire grandmother, 90-ish, respectable and expensively Tory, told a friend of mine on the phone last night: "He's definitely gay. I'm sick of these men hiding behind bushes. Why don't they just come out?"

Because they don't have to if they don't want to, grandma. David Laws wanted to stay in the closet so as not to upset his Catholic mum. Fair enough, I say, though he laid himself open to the public funds charge, the ostensible reason for going after Hague too.

So should I have been round the FCO dustbins sniffing the sheets? Well, that depends on what you think is a legitimate matter of public interest.

By and large, I don't think people's sex lives are unless they are public hypocrites, funding their lifestyles improperly from the public purse, or want to put details into the public domain - as many people seem to want to do.

For instance, Tony and Cherie Blair's memoirs both contain a teeny bit more detail about their ongoing enthusiasm for each other than I might have wished. And I'm almost certain the model Jordan, aka Katie Price, cooperates with the tabloids (that's a joke by the way).

But Hague? If he was indeed having an affair with Chris Myers - or his imaginary sister, Christine - and put him/her on the public payroll, that would be a legitimate target for fearless investigators such as Guido who is neither as noble nor disinterested as he persuades himself is the case.

Is that likely? Ask yourself. Hague may have spotty judgement - on Europe or in hiring Myers at all. They are obviously chums and the Daily Mail quotes anonymous Tory colleagues today as saying he is "personally naive" and becomes "platonically infatuated" when he likes someone, as he rarely does. That figures; he was a strange lad when I first saw him, lecturing Margaret Thatcher from the podium at the Tory conference at age 16.

But not even Hague would do something so rash and improper - quite lethal to his political career - as hire a lover at the taxpayer's expense. He hired Myers. It must mean it was all innocent. Yes? No?

I know what you're thinking. The latest statement confirms that Hague and Myers occasionally shared a twin room on the campaign trail. It sounds like admirable austerity to me, saving the party cash. Politicians get attacked for extravagance. Now they get hammered for saving money. You just can't win.

All of which has ended up with Hague having to explain how he and Ffion have been trying unsuccessfully to have children for years. We can all see how sad that is for them, as for couples in their situation. But to reveal this to prove you are straight ... oh dear again. How much sadder and more undignified. Not that it proves anything.

As I type, John Humphrys is milking the tale with as much thinly-veiled enthusiasm as Radio 4's Today programme can muster. It's the high-minded broadsheet version of tabloid humbug and wouldn't have happened like this even a few years ago, not rehashing the gossip on the BBC or in the broadsheets. Even the FT carries Hague's denial on page one today.

On air, Mirror editor turned Guardian media pundit Roy Greenslade, who disagreed with my contention that the Laws affair was about sexual hounding, not about money, is huffing and puffing about gossip seeping from the blogosphere into the news pages and how difficult it becomes. Hmm.

Today's Daily Mail has turned the tale with characteristic nimbleness from gay sex into one of domestic tragedy: "Our baby agony, by the Hagues." For the broadsheets and the Beeb it's now about Hague's "judgment".

But what about our collective judgment? What about Guido's? When he wrote "one witness told Guido that the room sharing couple's body language at breakfast was eye opening" what was he thinking?

Foreign secretary to meet German counterpart today after resignation of Christopher Myers due to pressure of 'untrue allegations'

William Hague will attempt to draw a line under the controversy surrounding his private life today after denying an "improper" relationship with an adviser and revealing deeply personal information about his marriage.

The foreign secretary is due to meet his German counterpart for talks at the Foreign Office as he seeks to move on from the story, fuelled by speculation about the nature of his relationship with his special adviser, Christopher Myers, who quit his job yesterday.

Hague took the extraordinary step of denying any relationships with men and revealing details about his wife's miscarriages to dispel rumours that he had made an "improper" appointment in hiring Myers.

The speculation about Hague, a former Tory leader, was prompted by the publication two weeks ago of photos of him joking with Myers last year.

Hague admitted they had shared a twin-bed room "occasionally" during the general election campaign.

But he denied that they had been involved in a relationship, and said his marriage was strong. He illustrated the point with an account of his difficulty in starting a family with his wife of 13 years, Ffion, who has suffered the trauma of multiple miscarriages, including one this summer.

Government sources stressed that the statement was Hague's idea and that it was fully supported by his wife. But Andy Coulson, the Downing Street director of communications, was heavily involved.

Downing Street has been irritated with Hague's handling of the matter. One senior Tory said: "It is pretty clear that Downing Street has had reservations about how this has been handled. They feel the whole situation is a mess and it had to be sorted."

Hague first employed Myers during the general election campaign as a constituency aide. After Hague was appointed to the cabinet, Myers became a policy adviser on a salary reported to be about £30,000.

There had been unease in Downing Street at Hague's judgment in appointing a 25-year-old graduate with little apparent expertise in foreign affairs.

According to Hague, Myers resigned as a result of the "pressure" put on his family due to the "untrue and malicious allegations made about him".

In his statement yesterday Hague said: "Any suggestion that his appointment was due to an improper relationship between us is utterly false, as is any suggestion that I have ever been involved in a relationship with any man."

Hague admitted to "occasionally" sharing hotel rooms with Myers during the election.

But he added: "Neither of us would have done so if we had thought that it in any way meant or implied something else. In hindsight, I should have given greater consideration to what might have been made of that, but this is in itself no justification for allegations of this kind, which are untrue and deeply distressing to me, to Ffion and to Christopher."

Following reports that his marriage was in difficulty, the foreign secretary took the unusual step of revealing aspects of his private life with Ffion.

Hague said: "I have made no secret of the fact that Ffion and I would love to start a family. For many years this has been our goal. Sadly, this has proved more difficult for us than for most couples.

"We have encountered many difficulties and suffered multiple miscarriages, and indeed are still grieving for the loss of a pregnancy this summer. We are aware that the stress of infertility can often strain a marriage, but in our case, thankfully, it has only brought us closer together. It has been an immensely traumatic and painful experience but our marriage is strong and we will face whatever the future brings together."

Hague acknowledged that releasing his statement would cause "distress" for their families but insisted he had to reveal the "straightforward truth".

He said: "We have never made this information public because of the distress it would cause to our families and would not do so now were it not for the untrue rumours circulating which repeatedly call our marriage into question. We wish everyone to know that we are very happily married. It is very regrettable to have to make this personal statement, but we have often said to each other 'if only they knew the truth ... ' Well, this is the straightforward truth."

Hague has long spoken of the importance of marriage.

A year into their relationship he said that "marriages are made in heaven but it is up to each of us to make them work here on earth". Hague met Ffion Jenkins in 1995 when he was secretary of state for Wales and she was his private secretary.

He proposed after four months of courtship and the pair kept their relationship virtually secret in the run-up to the announcement of their engagement.

But they shocked many Conservatives, including Lady Thatcher, when they slept in the same room during the party conference.

They married in a small ceremony at the House of Commons crypt in December 1997.

Over the years the Hagues have rarely spoken of their private life.

But Hague said circumstances forced them to issue a statement after "continued and hurtful speculation".

This, says William Hague, is "the straightforward truth", in one of the most extraordinary statements I have ever read from a senior politician.

The foreign secretary admits sharing twin hotel rooms with the man he later appointed - at taxpayers' expense - as his special adviser.

Today Christopher Myers resigned his position.

Hague insists that "Any suggestion that his appointment was due to an improper relationship between us is utterly false" before going much further denying that "I have ever been involved in a relationship with any man".

William Hague addresses delegates at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester, 2009

It goes on to reveal a sad, and up till now private, story about his marriage.

Ffion, it says, has "suffered multiple miscarriages" and the couple "are still grieving for the loss of a pregnancy this summer".

Hague knows that this is an open invitation to prurient media organisations to challenge the truth of his statement.

It is also an invitation for public sympathy. It is a story that, in tomorrow morning's papers, will rival the tales told by Tony Blair.

Andrew Sparrow with all today's politics news - including a press conference from William Hague

8.47am: William Hague is holding a press conference today, at 10.30am. But it's not about Christopher Myers, the Foreign Office special adviser who occasionally shared a twin-bedded room with Hague during the election campaign and who resigned yesterday to quash "untrue and deeply distressing" rumours of an affair with his boss. Hague has got a routine meeting with Guido Westerwelle, the German foreign minister, and they are holding an on-camera press briefing to discuss what they had to say. According to one Foreign Office source, the only comment Hague is likely to make about Myers will be along the lines of "I've said all I want to say about this". (He issued a long and candid personal statement yesterday afternoon.) But you never know. I'll be covering it closely.

Otherwise, there's not much in the diary. The papers are full of stories about the Tony Blair book and there will probably be more to say about that. Diane Abbott, one of the Labour leadership contenders, is giving a speech this morning at Policy Exchange with the title "The Big Society: A Big Con?" As usual, I'll also be taking a look at the papers, covering any breaking news and bringing you all the best politics from the web.

Contrary to Tony Blair's criticisms, Gordon Brown messed up because he believed in New Labour principles too greatly

David Miliband, Peter Mandelson, Tony Blair - all loudly insist that New Labour should not be abandoned. None of them seems to be aware that New Labour collapsed under the weight of its own contradictions some while back, leaving behind it a frightening political and economic vacuum. New Labour ideas, such as they were, could only thrive in periods of strong economic growth. In fact, they rested on the assumption that successive Blair governments had found the crock of gold at the end of the rainbow, and banished the cycle of boom and bust.

That was certainly a crock, but it unfortunately did not contain precious metal. Blair may argue that Gordon Brown messed up because he abandoned New Labour principles. But the truth is Brown messed up because he believed in them too greatly. When the bust came, the government was entirely unprepared for it, precisely because it believed such a thing could not happen. Brown's instinct was to throw money at reviving a system that had collapsed, so that things could continue as before. But they cannot.

Supporters of Brown - and there still are some - argue that the rectitude of his economic stimulus package is confirmed by recent figures showing that the UK economy grew by a faster-than-expected 1.2% in the second quarter of the year. Less convincingly, the chancellor, George Osborne, claims the figures show that his emergency budget restored business confidence. That's quite a claim, considering that the figures cover the period from April to June, and the budget was announced on 22 June. The fact that Osborne is willing to make such silly assertions is hardly soothing.

More disinterested observers suggest that the positive figures were boosted hugely by the construction industry, which grew at its fastest rate since 1963, due mainly to previous inactivity because of bad winter weather. But while that argument sounds sensible, the influence of the stimulus package cannot be waved away.

The reality is that such measures as quantitative easing, negligible interest rates, and continued borrowing to support the public sector, have helped to cushion individuals during the recent recession, dealing a less long-lasting blow to consumer confidence than might otherwise have fallen. Yet who really believes that Britain can or should return to conspicuous, credit-driven consumption underpinned by house-price inflation? Only true believers in New Labour, I'm afraid.

What becomes ever more clear as David Miliband, Blair and Mandelson extol the virtues of their tarnished creed, is that their great love of New Labour rests entirely on their belief that "middle-class voters" are the key to achieving and maintaining power. Blair himself emphasises that his political achievements can be summed up in the fact that "I won three elections. Up to then, Labour had never even won two successive full terms. The longest Labour government had lasted six years. This lasted 13. It could have . . . gone on longer, had it not abandoned New Labour."

Like most of the population, I have not read Blair's autobiography yet. Perhaps it contains a detailed description of the manifold ways in which Brown broke with New Labour, thus destroying his party's run of election wins. I'm afraid, however, that I'm at a loss to see what these great abandonments were. Brown's time in office was dominated by the economic crisis. What would the distinctive New Labour way of dealing with this have been?

The left wants public services protected, despite the deficit. The right wants them slashed, with unconscionable speed. Brown's government wanted to halve the deficit, within a governmental term. Blair says the New Labour way would have been to press for reform. But cuts even of the magnitude wanted by Brown cannot be achieved without reform anyway. So, that sounds like a third way to me, and it did not convince the electorate. (Perhaps the electorate was right. Obama's stimulus, for example, does not seem to have gained purchase against a double-dip either.)

It was New Labour's pet "working man", John Prescott, who announced: "We are all middle-class now." If one subscribes to the sentiment, one has no difficulty in comprehending why the "middle-class vote" should be so important. Sadly, however, Prescott's statement is an aspiration, not a fact - much like Brown's famous announcement that every state-educated child would have the same cash spent on her as every privately educated child.

New Labour believed that they could make everyone middle-class. They wanted every second person to have a degree, regardless of whether the employment market could absorb this. They were so keen for people to own their own homes that they ran a mile from supporting rent controls or the building of council housing. They liked the idea of everyone "working for themselves", even if this really meant working under contract for someone else, with no employment rights. If you had not heaved yourself into the middle class, or even if you lived on the cusp of such splendour, then your failure would be subsidised to "lift" you out of poverty - if you were an innocent child, anyway. The increased gap between the rich and the poor, and the halt in social mobility, gave the lie to New Labour's dreams before the crash even came.

New Labour subscribed to the highly partial idea that the private sector would naturally enrich the whole population - even if it was based in the south-east, operating internationally and dedicated only to shareholder value - while government would still be really, really important, and greatly, greatly adored, because it ruled a large public sector from the centre. Neither plan has worked out too well.

Up until his last moments in power, Brown continued to argue for high public spending, because cutting public spending would "take money out of the economy". Somehow, this strange assertion - that borrowing money from the bond markets, then paying the money-men back later, with interest, was "putting money into the economy" - made sense to him. This was the grim apotheosis of New Labour, not a break with it.

Britain had a command economy of sorts - the public sector - but it was dependent on the largesse of the international money markets, which "created" the wealth that would free everyone. For too many people, it has turned out, "freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose" (Kris Kristofferson wrote that lyric after he'd lost his job and access to his child).

All there is now is dangerous, scary, hysterical crisis management of a command economy that is startlingly vulnerable precisely because the private economy has become so ungovernable. It would be nice to see some of its progenitors (including Miliband the Younger) showing some real understanding of the mistakes of the past. Because then, there might be hope that they can come up with some credible plans for the future.

Medical crutches such as methadone can help, but rehabilitation works and should be supported

Some of those who spoke out against the Conservative suggestion that drug rehabilitation might be preferable to addiction management using methadone were well-meaning but patronising. The most miserable aspect of Labour's methadone policies is that they encouraged people to believe that in switching from illegal drugs to methadone, they have become "clean". This is a delusion. The most defeatist aspect is that the policies foster the idea that drug addiction is virtually impossible to overcome. Another delusion. It is right to understand drug addiction as a manifestation of psychological pain. But people should be encouraged to face their traumas rather than bury them. I'm not in favour of removing medical crutches that make addicts less of a threat (and I'd advise Cameron to think twice before doing it). But I'm not in favour of leading addicts to believe that they are not capable of doing any better by themselves.

It seems qualifications in traditional subjects are no longer useful

Earlier in the summer there were rumblings of rage at the recent trend towards educating half the population to degree level. This expansion appears to have spawned the disagreeable but predictable consequence that university qualifications have been devalued. Then, more recently, the news that one in four lap-dancers have degrees was greeted in some quarters with suggestions that lap-dancing was, ergo, a perfectly respectable career choice for intelligent young ladies. Clearly, fewer degrees in English literature and classics should be offered, to make way for the range of degrees in sex work that must be swiftly established.

The photograph of Tony Blair taken for the Guardian yesterday caught the former prime minister unawares

His mouth is gaping, his grey eyes wide open, his eyebrows raised in synchronised shock. In the picture accompanying his interview in yesterday's Guardian, Tony Blair looks like a cross between an effete rabbit caught blinking in the headlights, and a duelling cowboy who's been beaten to the draw.

Actually, the surprise is genuine, and Blair's stance is far less of a pose than you might think, according to David Levene, the Guardian photographer who took the picture.

"I'd just changed my lighting setup," explains Levene, "and I'd told him that I was 'just doing a few tests, just seeing how the lights work'".

In fact Levene was busily snapping away. "At that point he was just listening to me, he wasn't posing. And these are the moments you really strive for." It was a rare flicker of facial candour from Blair. "He wanted to put out a certain image of himself, so in the rest of the shoot he's looking very earnest, very downbeat. It was very difficult to get him to do anything else," says Levene.

And while Blair's oft-used creaseless, linen blue shirt looks ludicrously over-ironed, for Levene, it was a wardrobe choice from heaven. "The blue colour, combined with the grey background, did help lift his skin-tones. I'd been worried he'd come in a suit and tie."

You are a London Labour Party or affiliated trade union member. A ballot paper has (probably) landed on your doormat, inviting you to choose Ken Livingstone or Oona King to be Labour's candidate to take on (probably) Boris Johnson in the 2012 London mayoral election. You might have already decided which way to cast your vote, but if you're in a dither or just a bit indifferent, perhaps I can help you make up your mind.

Both candidates claim to be the one better equipped to see off "good old Boris" - GOB, for short? - just three months before the 2012 Olympic Games. This, I'm quite sure, is an important consideration for you, dear undecided voter. Oona has made the case that she is far better placed to attract the sorts of Londoners who rejected Ken in 2008, having in many cases backed him in the previous mayoral contests of 2000 and 2004. By this she means those in suburban areas and the full range of the middle-classes, two categories which substantially overlap. From day one she characterised herself as "the unity candidate" and has argued that Ken's appeal would be restricted to Labour's core vote, which simply isn't big enough to win the day.

Is she right? Ken's response has been to claim that he has a long record of mobilising broad coalitions of electors, despite being depicted throughout his political career as divisive and extreme. That is true, but it has become less so over the years. It is also true - as Oona said in a speech last night - that a lot of people voted for Boris two years ago out of dislike for Ken. Twenty-two percent of voters surveyed by TCC on behalf of London Councils said they put their cross next to the name of the Conservative candidate rather than the Labour one because they "disliked the other candidate more", compared with just seven percent who did the reverse.

This is all part of the biggest problem Ken would face in a second campaign against Boris - a feeling among voters that he has nothing new to offer, that he's not the man for them and has "had his time". He would urgently need to change such voters' minds. That is why I've long argued that if he becomes the candidate he needs to refresh and re-broaden his appeal in imaginative ways if he is to make the most of the very real chance he'd have of winning back City Hall. Undecided "selectors" of Labour's candidate might ask themselves if he's willing or able to make such changes.

However, they might also ask themselves if the possible advantages of choosing Oona could ever be greater than the probable advantages of choosing Ken. That same post-2008 survey by TCC showed that 23 percent of voters picked Ken over Boris partly on the basis of his experience (only three percent did the reverse). That huge experience in London politics, going way back to the 1970s, has not disappeared. Could the attractions of Oona's relative youth ever outweigh it? Then there is the continuing importance of the Labour core vote in the capital, which should never be downplayed.

While Ken has lost ground across the middle-class spectrum, he slightly improved his position among working-class Londoners in 2008 compared with 2004. Just as he inspires strong dislike among some Londoners he continues to command fierce loyalty among many others, who see him as a loyal champion. Even if, for the sake of argument, it is accepted that Oona could reach voters who will never embrace Ken again, could she ever mobilise those who continue to admire him as he very likely would? Could she as effectively orchestrate and articulate a spirit of resistance to a coalition government that seems destined to be suffering from traditional mid-term blues at the very same time as the next London elections take place?

In an ideal world, perhaps the ideal Labour candidate to challenge Boris would be a perfect combination of Oona and Ken: exuding youthful energy, able to appeal across barriers of sex and ethnicity, enormously well-known, able to strike fear into an Tory opponent, passionately concerned about young people and crime, able to read the mood of Londoners at large, hugely knowledgeable about the business of negotiating with governments and using mayoral power, with an ability to inspire loyalty among the working-class, trust among the middle-class, and to speak to the concerns of inner and outer London with equal eloquence.

Were I able to vote in the selection process - which I'm not - I would ask myself which of the two candidates is the more likely to personify that dream hybrid in the months leading up to May 2012 and I a would plant my "x" accordingly.

A defence of arts funding should be accompanied by careful thought about the smartest ways to engage the young in culture

The comprehensive spending review may not take place till October, but already a number of schemes and programmes designed to engage children and young people in the arts have been scrapped or curtailed, sent to the back of the priority list.

A Night Less Ordinary, Find Your Talent and the future jobs fund have all taken a hit - with no certain future funding or suitable replacements. Even smaller-scale projects such as the Royal Shakespeare Company's arts journalist bursary scheme, which aims to provide professional development for young journalists who can help the RSC reach young audiences, have been axed. This year may be the programme's last, unless the RSC manages to find a private donor.

For all their flaws and imperfections such schemes are not only well-intentioned, they also offer real opportunity and access. So what does their demise mean for young people?

The swingeing cuts to come at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport are considerable - up to 40% - and could leave education and outreach programmes for young people severely neglected. Lobbying against such a threat is imperative, but I'd argue that the cuts may also provide an opportunity to examine existing projects and devise imaginative funding models to ensure that programmes aren't only adequately provisioned, but thoughtfully considered. The A Night Less Ordinary scheme, Arts Council England's (ACE) free theatre ticket scheme for under-26-year-olds, may have a few detractors (Margaret Hodge admitted that its rollout was "rushed") but it has nonetheless provided young people with access to art. It could have eventually been altered or improved after an assessment period.

Rajiv Nathwani, a 22-year-old founding member of Theatre Ninjas - a website and iPhone app that allows theatres to offer last-minute free tickets for their shows at the Edinburgh Fringe festival - argues that the ACE scheme could have been better targeted and publicised:

"The implementation seems to have been rushed and therefore its impact has failed to be meaningful. Instead of theatres linking up with, say, volunteer organisations, schools, colleges and pupil referral units to try and bring in new audiences, they have instead rewarded regular playgoers like myself with many free tickets."

Still, Nathwani maintains the scheme was beneficial, albeit in need of major tweaking.

Meanwhile, Find Your Talent, the government's pilot cultural offering for children and young people run by Creativity, Culture and Education (CCE), helped young people gain practical work-experience in the creative industries and develop artistic skills (such as playing a musical instrument or performing on stage). Paul Collard, chief executive of CCE, says "the real implications of the discontinuation of schemes like Find Your Talent will not become clear until the comprehensive spending review in autumn. The government may decide to substitute these programmes with their own initiatives, or it may end up being a whole failed retrenchment that the government has engaged in."

With the future jobs fund slashed, it isn't just cultural education that is suffering; the hopes of many young people wishing to enter the creative industries have also been dashed. The abolition of the fund, which provided paid work experience for young people who were struggling to find employment, means that youngsters keen on getting into the creative industries but devoid of connections or funds to work for free will now find it increasingly difficult, if not impossible, to get their foot in the door - unless the government finds a suitable replacement to the scheme.

But Ryan Murray, a 22-year-old member of Tate Britain's youth forum believes that "the cuts will force us to be creative. It will be a matter of where and how arts organisations will find the money. However and wherever the funding comes from, as long as we ensure there is funding to achieve the main objective of inspiring young people and engaging them in arts and culture, then we've done our job."

Now is the time to develop not just an offensive (anti-cuts) strategy, but also a defensive one. What are the lessons learned from the previous schemes? How can we better target the right audience? In this age of austerity, creativity and imagination are also key: are there new and better models of funding programmes for the young?

In his memoir, A Journey, Tony Blair admits to drinking to unwind. But is half a bottle of wine and a whisky that much?

What with Gordon Brown breathing down his neck, the absence of weapons of mass destruction and John Prescott as his deputy prime minister, it's perhaps not surprising Tony Blair hit the bottle as soon as the sun was over the yardarm.

In his autobiography A Journey, Blair admits relying on alcohol to unwind from prime-ministerial responsibilities but insists his intake was, "not excessively excessive". Perhaps he's comparing himself with Winston Churchill, who reputedly drank two or three scotches, half a bottle of champagne and a few brandies each evening?

Blair's daily intake is certainly more middle class and middle aged. A "stiff whisky or G and T before dinner, couple of glasses of wine or even half a bottle with it," he says. Perhaps he wasn't familiar with his government's recommended daily limit - no more than three to four units for a man (and two to three for a woman). I totted up Blair's units with the chief executive of Alcohol Concern, Don Shenker. Half a bottle of wine is around five units, and a pub measure of whisky is one unit - Blair's is likely to be more than that, but he gets the benefit of the doubt. It still comes to six units - two more than a prime minister should be necking. However, it makes him a man of the people - one-in-three men and one-in-five women drink above the suggested limits.

"It puts him in the bracket of higher risk for health problems such as diabetes, liver cirrhosis and some cancers," says Shenker. It's also a level of drinking that can cause problems (such as rows) with family, friends and work colleagues. The NHS's Clinical Knowledge Service says that four to six units of alcohol can make you more "reckless and uninhibited" in your decision-making.

Blair's alcohol confession comes with hospital admissions due to alcohol standing at almost a million a year. One of the local authorities with the highest levels? His old stomping ground of Islington.

Prime ministers from Herbert 'Squiffy' Asquith to Margaret Thatcher have enjoyed a drink - but Winston Churchill was in a league of his own

Tony Blair's candid admission that he used alcohol as a "prop" in his stressful life - and probably drank more than was wise - may irritate voters who suffer weekend rowdiness which they blame on New Labour's promotion of laxer licensing laws.

But drinking as such has rarely been a controversial matter for modern British prime ministers, though lesser colleagues have been ruined after falling in the gutter. Literally so in the case of George Brown, Harold Wilson's mercurial deputy: he was a talented politician who - fatally - could not hold his drink as hard-drinkers like Michael Foot or Nye Bevan could.

Wilson himself drank furtively, pints and his pipe in public, brandy and cigars indoors. He had a drink before PMQs, which he hated - as most PMs do. Jim Callaghan is the exception: he gave it up during his premiership (1976-79).

So Blair is unremarkable in taking comfort from a glass, though he took care to stay fit and monitor his erratic heart. He had seen that his convivial predecessor, John Smith - a prodigious Olympic medallist for boozing, he notes in A Journey - had never been drunk when it mattered, but drank heavily in company despite his own heart condition. In 1994 it killed him.

A century ago HH Asquith, the last Liberal premier (1908-16), was often the worse for wear at the dispatch box and acquired the nickname "Squiffy".

His successor David Lloyd George, though an accomplished adulterer, disapproved - a reflection of his Welsh nonconformist roots and the temperance movement's influence before world war one, which brought a clampdown on drunkenness, especially in munitions factories.

Margaret Thatcher, the most dominant PM since Winst
on Churchill, also drank - Scotch for preference, sometimes before lunch.

She also drank at night - too much after her retirement, it has been reported. But Churchill was - and remains - in a league of his own, boasting: "I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me."

His tastes were catholic and his appetite powerful, though he is usually associated with Pol Roger champagne and brandy.

It was part of his image, along with the Havana cigars, at a time when lapses by public figures were more closely protected by their friends and the media.

Any suggestions of drunkenness in the Commons were usually a matter of private speculation and Labour MP Bessie Braddock's remark - "Winston, you are drunk" - is apocryphal. So is his ungallant reply: "Bessie, you are ugly, but tomorrow I shall be sober."

Churchill got a Nobel prize for his - but other efforts by former PM's have succumbed to score-settling and defensiveness

Winston Churchill had the right idea about memoirs. "History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it," he revealed during the second world war. Most former prime ministers set out with a similar ambition, though few prove as successful in setting the terms of debate as Churchill's heroic six-volume account of the war largely did for many years. It won him a Nobel prize for literature.

Tony Blair is only the latest former occupant of Number 10 to try his luck. He has one advantage shared by Churchill and Margaret Thatcher: a lucrative market in the United States, a place where he, like them, is more admired than at home.

Sales are only one test, and the awkward truth is that the memoirs of lesser politicians (minor figures with a good writing style and a ringside seat, such as Alan Clark or Chris Mullin) often prove more enduring. So do those of the also-rans of politics, less calculating characters such as Denis Healey, Rab Butler or Norman Tebbit.

After enduring attack from all sides, former premiers are too keen to explain and justify; they tend toward caution, defensiveness, and an unwillingness to exhibit vulnerability. Blair has clearly made an effort to avoid such pitfalls. He even admits liking a drink.

Rare indeed are the killer facts in such books, score-settling is more the norm.

Sir Anthony Eden's three-volume Full Circle passed up the chance to tell the truth of the Suez deception. Harold Wilson's dull thousand-page The Labour Government 1964-1970 makes no mention of his domineering political secretary, Marcia Williams.

Jim Callaghan's Time and Chance was modest and decent, like the man himself. So was John Major's The Autobiography, an unexpected bestseller for HarperCollins. It revealed a youthful affair with an older woman (but not the affair with Edwina Currie), and made him an estimated £600,000 against the £3m plus earned by Lady Thatcher's two volumes of score-settling, which sold worldwide.

She published while Major was still in office but was circumspect not to criticise him too much. Clem Attlee, always modest and famously reticent, guaranteed his book, laconically titled As It Happened, was published while he was still Labour leader, its most lively passages discreetly cut in advance.

At a likely financial cost (delay weakens market value), Blair waited until Gordon Brown lost power (as he feared he would) before revealing Brown has "zero emotional intelligence" and a temper. Others got in first. Ted Heath's The Course of My Life did not appear until 1998 when he had already said most of the unkind things he wanted to about Thatcher. But disloyalty or being boring are not the only risks. Money is another.

Blair deflected accusations of blood money by giving all his proceeds (£4m is probably half what Churchill made) to a British Legion fund for injured servicemen. Just before his fall in 1922, Lloyd George got into hot water by making a deal worth £3m at today's prices to publish his memoirs and serialise them in the Sunday Times. In the event they appeared only in 1933, settling scores with Douglas Haig and other first world war generals the Liberal leader had been unable to sack at the time; they were permanently diminished as a result.

Labour leadership candidate distances himself from former PM's near-endorsement of coalition's strategy to cut deficit

David Miliband last night distanced himself from his old political patron, Tony Blair, after the former prime minister rocked the Labour party by coming close to endorsing the economic strategy of the Conservative-led coalition government.

As the Tories hailed Blair for supporting the government's controversial plans to eliminate Britain's fiscal deficit by 2015, the shadow foreign secretary insisted that only Labour had the right plans to cut the deficit.

"I am clear we must tackle the deficit, but we need to do it in a Labour way, that's why I would halve the deficit over four years," he said.

David Miliband spoke out after Blair concluded his memoirs with an attack on world leaders for following the financial crisis in 2008 with "deficit spending, heavy regulation ... and jettisoning the reinvention of government in favour of the rehabilitation of government".

In a passage which prompted one member of the shadow cabinet to lambast Blair as "so right wing", Blair wrote: "If governments don't tackle deficits, the bill is footed by taxpayers, who fear big deficits now mean big taxes in the future, the prospect of which reduces confidence, investment and purchasing power. This then increases the risk of a prolonged slump."

The former prime minister offered some support for Alistair Darling, the former chancellor, who won a battle with Gordon Brown in government to pledge to halve the deficit in four years.

"Fiscal consolidation has to proceed with care," Blair wrote. "I agree entirely that a precipitate withdrawal of stimulus packages would be wrong."

But Blair wrote that Brown lost the election after abandoning New Labour by raising the top rate of tax to 50%, signalling a "return to tax and spend", and increasing national insurance to tackle the deficit. "We should have taken a New Labour way out of the economic crisis: kept direct taxes competitive, had a gradual rise in VAT and other indirect taxes to close the deficit, and used the crisis to push further and faster on reform," he wrote.

The Tories warmly welcomed Blair's remarks, which came in the postscript to his memoirs. Lady Warsi, the Tory chair, said: "The coalition government is winning the argument on cutting the deficit to get the economy moving. Now even Tony Blair has backed it ... Tony Blair has also revealed the full extent of the last Labour government's failure - they failed to tackle the deficit, they failed to reform welfare and they failed to reform the NHS. Labour knew they were spending too much before the financial crisis but failed to do anything about it."

David Miliband, who is being portrayed as the heir to Blair by his opponents in the Labour leadership contest, moved quickly to reject the former prime minister's support for a VAT rise. "I oppose the rise in VAT because it's a regressive tax which hits the poorest the hardest, and under my deficit reduction plan those with the broadest shoulders would carry the biggest share of the burden," he said.

The shadow foreign secretary distanced himself from Blair in a Channel 4 News hustings debate last night which was aired as the former PM all but endorsed him for the leadership in a BBC interview.

"I am my own person," Miliband said. "I look forward to the day when Tony says he is a Milibandite rather than people asking me whether I am a Blairite."

His rivals used Blair's remarks on the deficit to highlight their differences with the former prime minister. Ed Miliband, the candidate most likely to defeat his brother, said: "New Labour's comfort zone offers no new answers for Labour or Britain's future. Tony was once a moderniser but I am now the candidate offering the change needed to reach out to the millions who lost trust in Labour."

Ed Balls, who says that Darling's deficit reduction plans could jeopardise the economic recovery, said: "Tony Blair has come out today and said he's basically supporting a Conservative-Liberal coalition policy, he's supporting the rise in VAT and cuts in public spending."

While Brown stayed silent, there were protests from his camp about Blair's book. Michael Dugher, his former spokesman who is now Labour MP for Barnsley East, told Radio 4's The World at One: "People forget, in 2005, particularly in the aftermath of the Iraq war, Tony Blair was quite unpopular in parts of the country and the party. Gordon Brown played a very significant role in the 2005 election victory."

The former deputy PM Lord Prescott warned that Labour faced years in the wilderness if it did not resolve its differences. He told the same programme: "The dangers are - as we saw with the Tories [after 1997] - that if the divisions continue and there is a suggestion that one [candidate] won't follow if the other is elected, that would be very, very damaging for us. It damaged Labour for 18 years, it damaged the Tories for 13 years."

President Barack Obama meets with Middle East leaders in Washington before opening direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians scheduled to begin 2 September

Officials to examine weapons inspector's post mortem files this week before making recommendations to attorney general

The attorney general's office is examining files relating to the death of David Kelly, a move which could herald a full inquest into the weapons inspector's death.

Officials acting on behalf of Dominic Grieve, the government's senior law officer, had requested the Ministry of Justice to supply reports of Kelly's post mortem examination, and now have them.

The move came after a group of prominent legal and medical experts called for a full inquest into the 2003 death of the scientist. A spokeswoman for the attorney general said the files had arrived in the office this week after being requested "quite a while ago".

Officials will examine the documents this week before making recommendations to the attorney general, who has the power to order a full inquest.

An inquest at the time was suspended by the then lord chancellor, Lord Falconer, ahead of the Hutton inquiry, which investigated the circumstances of Kelly's death. The inquiry concluded he had killed himself by cutting an artery in his wrist. However, it applied a less stringent test than would have been used in an inquest, where a coroner has to be sure "beyond reasonable doubt" that a person intended to kill themselves.

Last month, nine experts including Michael Powers, a QC and former coroner, and Julian Blon, a professor of intensive care medicine, said in a letter to the Times that they believed that the official cause of death, haemorrhage from the severed artery, was "extremely unlikely".

"Insufficient blood would have been lost to threaten life," they said. "Absent a quantitative assessment of the blood lost and of the blood remaining in the great vessels, the conclusion that death occurred as a consequence of haemorrhage is unsafe."

In the latest instalment of the cartoonist's showcase, Ben Jennings turns his eye to the publication of the former PM's memoirs

Thanks for the thought Tony. Face the camera. Smile

o So here we go on     A Journey. And one of the first things Tony Blair has been keen to clear up is the fact that he long ago decided to donate the proceeds from the sale of the book to the British Legion. This was no 11th-hour gesture. It should raise a cool £4m, he says. Which makes it all the more commendable on the part of the ex-PM. Commendable too, that while benefiting from his largesse, the Legion exhibits a spiky sort of independence by featuring prominently in the latest edition of its magazine the controversial anti-war photomontage by Peter Kennard and Cat Picton Phillips. The construct, which angered No 10, shows a grinning, sinister Blair taking a picture of himself against a backdrop of a burning oilfield in Iraq.

o He wrote the book himself, we learn. In longhand. But the writing style seems a little familiar. "It's a great privilege and honour to do the job. And by the way, it really is," he writes on page 502. And recalling a terrorist threat in the skies above London after 9/11, he says: "It had been a technical error. I needed to sit down and Thank God after that one." Just the style of the St Albion parody run throughout his reign by Private Eye. Was he scribbling that as well?

o And with the Journey now fully under way the question must be asked: why is Prince of Darkness Peter Mandelson's own masterwork, The Third Man, on sale in the fiction section of WH Smith at Heathrow? What kind of message is that to send about the architect of New Labour? What are they trying to say?

o Ex-political titans. They are everywhere. And there is another on display at Portcullis House, Westminster, where hangs a portrait of John Major, obscured at present by transparent film with a large label. "Fragile artwork behind," it says. "He was famously thin-skinned as a premier," our guide explains. Amazing to see that replicated in a painting.

o Yes it's A Journey today. An arrival by the pope in a fortnight's time. What a life. Both requiring the most delicate preparations. Sad to say, then, that there is an unholy kerfuffle over the decision of organisers of Pope Benedict XVI's visit to stage a helpful briefing on Tuesday exclusively for the foreign press, excluding totally the British media. Not just a shut-out of our heathen mainstream titles. Conspicuously absent was the Catholic Herald. For all that, rumours of a papal visit without the pope remain unconfirmed.

o And perhaps now is the time to ask exactly what information was sought by the Q magazine reader who inquired during that publication's communal questioning of Bob Geldof: "Do you still have the pope's phone number?" Geldof assumed, as did we on highlighting the exchange last week, that it was a matter of communication, hence his answer: "He did call me once. I was watching Dynasty at the time." But Rod Davis of Cornwall gets in touch to put us right. "You may just have missed the point of the original question, as indeed does Bob Geldof: the pope's telephone number = VAT69 whisky, as in, 'I'd like a glass of pope's telephone number, please'." As we now know, Tony Blair used to ring the pope almost every night.

o In this time of austerity and cuts, it pays to focus on the few growth industries. The company Oil Spill Response seeks spill response specialists. Travel the world, react to disasters. Not just the Gulf of Mexico, or even the disaster waiting to happen in the Arctic. There is apparently more than enough calamity to keep the right recruits busy. An initial period bedding in but that, says the ad, is "just the start of the adventure". And the closing date. There isn't one. They need clean-up types in Southampton, Singapore and Bahrain all year round.

o Finally we note that the Right Rev Richard Chartres, the Bishop of London, places his good name and reputation in the hands of PR guardians Luther Pendragon. And so does the Lap Dancing Association. Separate accounts, different world.