Matthew Norman: Tony Blair and the perfect British scandal

The police are in a hideous position. Their boss has already dismissed the idea of cash for peerages as absurd

Mr Tony Blair may or not go out with a bang, but the question today on the lips of all would-be humorists is will he go out with a banging up? It is possible, if he clings to office long enough, that the Prime Minister will rise to his feet in a year or so, at the prompting of an Old Bailey usher, to be addressed as follows by a red-robed judge?

"Anthony Lynton Charles Blair, you have been found guilty by this court of an offence under the Honours (Prevention of Abuses) Act 1925. Not only have you flogged peerages of the realm after the fashion of a Fettes-educated Arthur Daley selling hookey ermine robes from the back of a Ford Transit, you have, in so doing, grievously betrayed the trust vested in you by your employer, the British people. I therefore have no choice but to sentence you to the maximum term permitted under the law. You will go to prison for two years. Take him down."

It is about as delicious a fantasy as anyone could have with their mental clothes on, but in what passes loosely for the real world of British justice, what are the chances of Mr Blair becoming the first person jailed for the crime since Maundy Gregory 73 years ago?

Glancing at the Act itself, they look excellent. "If any person accepts, obtains or agrees to accept or obtain," states the catchy Section 1 (1), "any gift, money or valuable consideration as an inducement or reward for procuring ... the grant of a dignity or title of honour to any person ... he shall be guilty of a misdemeanour."

Did Mr Blair agree to accept money from Dr Chai Patel and the other lads? By his own word, he absolutely did. Was the gift or loan, or loan masquerading as gift, procured in return for the grant of a title of honour? The reasonable juror would surely say that it certainly was.

Prima facie, in fact, it's such an open and shut case that Mr Blair and Lord Levy - the Fletch, as I like to think of him, to the PM's Lenny Godber - might as well start reminding their wives now to tie the yellow ribbon to the old oak tree for a year (assuming good behaviour) while they are in HMP Belmarsh engaging in the competitive postbag-sewing that will prove such a refreshing change from the tennis.

Then again, before anyone gets over-excited, it's worth recalling this distasteful fact: under British law, a criminal prosecution and a trial are still required before a prison sentence is passed. This fuddy-duddy aspect to the justice system is by no means to all tastes. Had Mr Blair and the last three Home Secretaries had their way, two years in jug is something a Community Services Officer could dish out to someone for smelling of foreign food or walking between the cracks in the pavement.

Yet still we cleave to the quaint ideal that no one can be jailed for more than six months unless found guilty by those known as their peers without having shelled out £1.5m for the privilege. This is where the problems begin. Before Cherie has to start worrying about blagging a cake from Patisserie Valerie and wangling a free saw-toothed file from Halford's, the Metropolitan Police must construct a case to persuade the Crown Prosecution Service to charge them with the crime.

Myself - and this is just the kind of cynicism the Prime Minister loathes - I have nagging doubts based on personal experience. In August 2004, my stolen car was recovered by police after a high-speed chase in Chelsea (at least it had gone up in the world) with two young men in it. I gave a statement and was asked to make myself available for the trial. Nearly two years on, not a dickie bird. I ring Hammersmith nick every few months, but no one ever rings back. The case appears to have been closed for want of evidence.

If the police cannot bring to trial two guys they arrested at the wheel of a stolen car, it's difficult to have confidence in their ability to prosecute the Prime Minister of Great Britain on what is probably no more, however convincing, than circumstantial evidence.

The task facing Deputy Assistant Commissioner John Yates, the poor chap lumbered with going through these particular motions, is to find a "paper trail". If there ever was any paper, we may assume that Lord Levy and the PM ate it long ago, but there almost certainly wasn't. As that fearlessly independent judicial titan Lord Hutton discovered, this regime has a phobia about writing anything down.

If the PM couldn't be bothered with anything so poncy as keeping minutes of meetings relevant to a forthcoming war, it's unlikely there's a sheet of lined A4 in Downing Street headed "To Do: 1) Ring Silvio B re Cherie's new watch; 2) Have a word with Michael L about getting that nice Dr Patel to unbelt."

A paper trial is the last thing Mr Yates, conscientious officer though he undoubtedly is, will wish to find. If he did, it would place him in a hideous position. After all, his ultimate boss is my cuddly friend Charles Clarke, and our Swiss finishing school-educated Home Secretary has already dismissed the notion of a criminal offence as absurd.

"The suggestion that there's cash for peerages ... is completely false," he declared on 16 March. "It's not the case." Ordinarily one might question the propriety of a justice minister seemingly attempting to paralyse an investigation before it began. But knowing what a sensitive little flower Mr Clarke is, we mustn't risk sending him to his bed with a fit of the vapours.

We are faced, then, with the delectable charade of leading Scotland Yard officers affecting to take seriously allegations which the Cabinet minister with direct power over their careers dismissed as facetious nonsense a fortnight ago. Over the coming weeks and possibly months, Scotland Yard will bombard us with press conferences about interviews with Dr Patel, Lord Levy and others, possibly including the PM and senior Conservatives.

Untold thousands of column inches will record these activities, the phone-ins will buzz with excitable wittering about the possible outcomes, Michael Crick will cheekily report any progress on Newsnight ... and at the end of it all, when the Blairs Ian and Tony and Charles Clarke judge that enough interest in this laughable, seedy affair has drained away, the Metropolitan Police will announce that, following the most exhaustive investigations, there is insufficient evidence for a prosecution.

Disappointing as that will be for professional fantasists, it's also probably the right outcome. Our prisons are quite overcrowded enough as it is (God have mercy on anyone who had to share a cell with Lord Levy), and the hilarity and humiliation will be punishment enough. In fact it will be a perfect British conclusion to a perfect British scandal.