Simon Carr: The Sketch

A very special mention from Mr Blunkett sets me all aglow

The Home Secretary singled the Sketch out for a rare honour from the floor of the House on Wednesday evening.

In 10 lines of Hansard, he forever enshrined the Sketch's reputation with a detailed exposition of its indolence, self-indulgence, nastiness, alcoholic habits and the predatory expenses it submits to The Independent. The glow is still with me. The other sketch writers are sick as cats. Sick. As. Cats. Ha ha!

Mr Blunkett had been referring to the need to deport people who weren't "conducive to the national good". Somehow, and for reasons that remain obscure, that reminded him of me.

"Just for Simon Carr of The Independent," he said, "I was not referring to braille to enable me to remember that point." Then he went on to the dinner thing, then the wine, the expenses and so forth. Then: "He cannot say anything more vile about me than he said on Tuesday morning" (he'd find an argument on that point) "so he can get his own back at length and undoubtedly often."

Let me lay it on with a trowel. Mr Blunkett, though blind, ranks as one of the two finest home secretaries this century and the equal of many home secretaries of the past century. He has it in him to be the best Tory home secretary since Henry Brooke.

What he described as vile (and disgusting, according to a source, vile and disgusting) was the Sketch's assertion that his inability to remember Oliver Letwin's 15 points-of-information questions made him look less than prime ministerial.

His supporters now claim he has a photographic memory. It may be so. Perhaps he didn't answer the questions because he just didn't want to. He just took refuge in confusion, babble, busted syntax, and a mournful loggorhea that was almost unbearable to listen to. Not answering the question is very prime ministerial, as we know, but I hope he won't think it vile to suggest it's a talent he needs to develop.

Tony Wright came up with a good education question. "Before the 11th of September, faith schools were a bad idea. Now they look like a mad idea." The last thing we wanted, he said, was schools segregated by faith.

Minister Estelle Morris, deploying more of her customary vulgarity than necessary, said: "Don't land the whole of the issue of segregated communities on the head of faith schools. Because that's not what creates it!" And that was why we had the new subject of citizenship on the curriculum.

Phil Woolas wanted to ensure no faith school should be able to turn away anyone of a different faith, thereby destroying the concept of a faith school. It's a perfectly political outcome: the destruction of the institution the politician sets out to support.

Ms Morris paid tribute to the Church of England for its "entirely inclusive attitude" in its schools. Is she mad, do you think? Education ministers can't say anything about teachers without paying tribute to them. What nauseating suck-ups they are. Teachers don't want to be paid more tributes. They want to be paid more money. Ministers don't have money.

They do have tributes. And so, at the end of question time, do teachers.

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