Yakking for Argyll

Why can’t we be more intelligent about assessing the impact of resigning ministers? It means something if the good ones go. But why furrow the brow for the chaff?

Current Housing Minister Caroline Flint is said to have had to be persuaded not to resign by the so-called ‘ginger chipmunk’, Hazel Blears. Transport Secretary, Ruth Kelly has already gone- in something of a flounce at having her ‘thunder’ (Sorry - thunder? She matters?) stolen. Blair friend Margaret Hodge, the Culture Minister is expected to go. Beverley Hughes, the current successor to Hodge’s former job as Children’s Minister, is also said to be read to quit.

Well - so what? These are all low-rent performers and together they don’t add up to a single good minister

Beverley Hughes has already had to resign over ‘unintentionally misleading’ people over the Home Office approving visa claims from eastern Europe despite warnings they were backed by forged documents.

Hodge had to vacate her former post as Children’s Minister in bad odour over her appalling record in failing to protect vulnerable children from abuse when she was Labour Leader of Islington Council, prior to becoming an MPi.

Caroline Flint is the archetypal cold-eyed Labour apparatchik, incapable of anything but mouthing the party line against all comers and all questions.

Ruth Kelly was far from being a successful minister in every department she served. Her one achievement was typically self-centred - outfacing Tony Blair when he once wanted to move her out of Education. Blair was weak at the time and couldn’t afford the hassle. The only thing she’ll be remembered for is the feature she apparently shares with Princess Stephanie of Monaco - high levels of circulating testosterone.

Now, if only the lowest-rent minister of them all - Dawn Primarolo (she of the v-e-r-y– s-l-o-w–s-p-e-a-k-i-n-g in case we plebs can’t understand things she clearly does not understand herself) could be persuaded to feel the stirrings of rebellion and resign too….

And don’t let’s forget Tessa Jowel - ‘managing’ the Lodon 2012 Olympics!

And there’s Harriet Harman, playing the feminist card with all the dogma and no commonsense. Her greatest energy - her only energy - is poured into advancing her own career. She’s alleged to have said on the night of Labour’s Glasgow East defeat by the SNP, ‘This is my moment’. If it is, it won’t last long.

But let’s keep the ‘ginger chipmunk’. She’ll never be a leader but she could become something of a national treasure, with her rare straightforwardness.