Day 3939: Fox Off

Friday:

And so farewell then, Fantastic Dr Fox, the Indefensible Secretary, who's resigned following revelations about his Best Man.

It's been clear for a while that, whatever his capabilities, Dr Fox is an arrogant tool who thinks the rules don't apply to him, whether its collective responsibility and not leaking your letters to the Prime Monster during the spending review or the ministerial code that says you don't give your mates free access to your Ministry of Defence contacts and top secret diary.

Questions that will probably remain unanswered now surround Dr Fox's links with the dodgy charity "Atlantic Bridge" (aka the Special Committee for Electing Conservatory Rightwing Eejits or, er, "SpECTRE") and whether it was no more than an old fashioned Conservatory SLUSH FUND. Was the Defenceless Secretary secretly running a behind-the-scenes covert shadow-ministry in order to get round those tricky Civil Service rules and Freedom of Information requests?

It's not like those naughty Conservatories haven't got form trying that elsewhere.

What leaves a nasty taste in the mouth though is the way that that was all too COMPLICATED for the press to pursue. It was only when the hint of a juicy SEX SCANDAL was stirred into the mix (with no supporting evidence whatsoever) that the press pack went a-Fox hunting.

It seems that subverting the rules of democracy just isn't as interesting as the possibility that Mr Foxy might have been touched by "THE GAY!" or even worse, a bit of the BISEXUAL. I know we don't expect any better of our tabloids – though we ought to be able to! – but when even the The Today Programme starts salivating over the salacious – as Mr Humpy did on Wednesday this week – then something's gone very wrong with the meeja.

The speculation is already mounting about a reshuffle, as though who's in the Cabinet is Strictly Come Governing rather than a serious business.

Mr Balloon has – to his CREDIT – been pretty reshuffle-intolerant so far. And that's a GOOD THING because ministers ought to get on with learning the detail of their jobs rather than being swept cluelessly from department to department and letting the Sir Humphries retain the upper hand every time. It would be much better – much as we'd love to see Captain Paddy take over – for this to be a simple one-out-one-in for the Conservatories, just as it was for the Liberal Democrats when Mr David Outlaws fell on his sword last year.

Of course, it doesn't help that Oily Leftwin has chosen this morning to be caught having a "Hello Trees! Hello Flowers!" moment with his Cabinet papers.