A fascinating business, this reshuffle lark.  Here are my initial thoughts on each of the roles, and the people now filling them.

Chancellor of the Exchequer: Alistair Darling
No surprises here, then.  He’s always struck me as a sort of inoffensive puppy, who does whatever he’s told, and does it very efficiently.  There’s no chance of this ending in a Blair/Brown relationship, I don’t think Darling has the driving ambition or the nous for that.  His opinion flips with whatever his bosses tell him: From devolution, to independence for the Bank of England, he just thinks what he’s told to think.  And I’m slightly scared of his eyebrows.

Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice: Jack Straw
I like Jack Straw.  He’s a man of some honour, and he says what he really thinks.  I don’t always agree with what he thinks, but I reckon he’s got his head screwed on, and will work well Justice.  Good for him.

Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury and Chief Whip: Geoff Hoon
Not a bad move at all.  Geoff Hoon’s slightly ridiculous and bumbling manner makes him bad at some jobs: Secretary of State for Defence being one of them, where I felt he was pretty terrible.  But I reckon he’s got a good political sense about him, and will probably do well as Chief Whip.

Leader of the House of Commons, Minister for Women, and Labour Party Chair: Harriet Harman
Not the person I would’ve put in the position of Leader of the House of Commons if I was hoping to push ahead with the excellent work on Parliamentary reform given a real boost in the last few months by Jack Straw.  Note also, in this age of apparent equality, that there’s still no equivalent Minister for Men.  As for Harriet Harman herself, I really have no opinion.

Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport: James Purnell
The Guardian calls him ‘good-looking’.  I don’t see it.  He looks more like one of those slightly suspicious characters in 24 who turns out to be head of the terrorists plotting to detonate a nuclear weapon on US soil.  Again.  Just like they were plotting last season.  But more pertinently, it seems utterly bizarre that the person in charge of culture and sport apparently isn’t in charge of the biggest thing in British culture and sport for decades: The Olympics.  I’m not sure whether that’s an example astounding idiocy or great brilliance.  On the one hand, it could lead to a giant scrap because of overlapping portfolios, but on the other, it could mean that culture outside of the Olympics can be concentrated on and cultivated by one individual, which might help to stop the diversion of all funding and support away from valid projects to be pumped into the Olympics.

Secretary of State for Defence, and Secretary of State for Scotland: Des Browne
No question of who he looks like: His Westminster nickname is Swiss Toni.  He’s been a reasonably good defence secretary up to now, apart from the little upset over the Iranian Hostages being allowed to sell their stories.  A good idea to keep him in his post.

Secretary of State for International Development: Douglas Alexander
A pretty inoffensive Scot, in a pretty inoffensive post.  Meh.

Minister for the Cabinet Office and Treasury of the Duchy of Lancaster: Ed Miliband
It’s the Miliblogger’s brother, who looks remarkably like Ernie.  And you can kind of convince yourself that Miliblogger himself looks a bit like Bert, if you screw your eyes up tight.  He seems a less ridiculous politician than his brother, and seems to understand the value of keeping quiet sometimes.

Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families: Ed Balls
A newly created job, covering one half of the old Department for Education and Skills, though quite why Brown has thrown ‘families’ into the brief is beyond me.  Ed Balls seems to have quite a shrewd political mind, but I’m not sure he’ll be all that great in this post.  But certainly an interesting one to watch.

Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills: John Denham
A minister for ‘innovation’? What a bizarre title.  But this is the other half of the DfES.  Not quite sure what to think of Mr Denham, to be honest.

Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs: Hilary Benn
It’s always struck me as odd that there’s a minister for ‘rural affairs’, as if it’s some niche topic, when, in reality, more people in our country live in ‘rural’ areas than cities.  But perhaps that’s not clear to Londoners.  Hilary Benn seems a very committed politician, who’s honest and will say what he thinks.  Despite his relatively low profile, I rather like Mr Benn – and he’s certainly better in this job than the Miliblogger.

Secretary of State for Health: Alan Johnson
Ding dong, the witch is dead! Or, at least, Mad Pat’s gone. For all her wrongs, though, I wouldn’t wish her to be leaving because of her dying mother, and I do feel sympathy for her. Brown has declared the NHS to be his priority (as Cameron did some months ago), so it will be interesting to see where this goes. Mr Johnson could be a great success, or a terrible failure. He’s a bit of a slime-ball, and was a big advocate of tuition fees. But a little bit of slime might just help him to appear amenable to the staff of the NHS, and if he’s slimy in the right way, he could make this work. But if he argues with Brown, as seems likely, and messes stuff up, he could be the sleazeball that loses Brown the next election. It’s a big risk, but it might just pay off.

Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs: David Miliband
Oh, dear god, why?  We’ve gone from the mildly bizarre caravanning foreign secretary of Margaret Beckett, to David ‘connect with the people’ Miliblogger – who only wants to connect with those who agree with him.  His much maligned (and hugely expensive) blog, combined with his wiki that had to be taken down, just make him look utterly ridiculous.  Jack Straw brought gravitas and diplomacy to this role.  Miliblogger simply ignores people he disagrees with – not exactly being diplomatic.  Why people think he’s a future Labour leader, I simply do not understand.

Secretary of State for the Home Department: Jacqui Smith
Another slightly unknown quantity.  It’s rumoured that no-one wanted this job, and it’s probably understandable.  Of late, it’s become something of a poisoned chalice.  Will she be the one to turn it round, and flourish in this pressured role?  I don’t see it happening.

Secretary for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform: John Hutton
So, out go the scary eyebrows, and in comes John Hutton. I’m not a fan of his, but I’ve no concrete idea why.  Perhaps it’s the association with the snake that is Alan Milburn, perhaps it’s that he shares a name with Lord Hutton, I don’t know.  But I don’t like him, and I don’t trust him.

Leader of the House of Lords and Lord President of the Council: Lady Ashton
Lady Ashton has got a tough act to follow in Baroness Amos, but she’s got form to do it.  Once Stonewall’s politician of the year, she’s also worked strenuously against forced marriage.  She had strong beliefs, and sticks to them.  I think she’ll do well.

Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government: Hazel Blears
The perma-smile moves to communities and local government.  It’s good that Hazel has got control of local government, for that is where I feel she rather belongs – and the sooner this poor naive woman is out of the national picture, the better for her and us.

Secretary of State for Nothern Ireland: Shaun Woodward
The butlered multi-millionaire ex-Conservative (and ex-editor of Esther Rantzen’s That’s Life) seems such an affably impotent guy that he might just be perfect for this role right now.  With so much progress in Northern Ireland, he’s not someone who’s going to rock the boat too much.  A good pick.

Secretary of State for Transport: Ruth Kelly
I think Ruth Kelly might go further in government than people think.  She’s a very controversial figure, but, like Mr Blair, nothing sticks.  The number of scandals she’s been involved in, from Home Information Packs, to turning down a job and the Department of Health because she’s against abortion, and at the Department of International Development because it promotes the use of condoms, to sending her son to a private school while at the Department for Education and Skills.  She’s a remarkably intelligent woman, and will be on the scene for a long time to come.  Whether or not that’s a good thing, I’m distinctly unsure.

Chief Secretary to the Treasury: Andy Burnham
One of those posts no-one really cares all that much about.  Burnham’s best bet is to keep it that way.

Secretary of State for Work and Pensions: Peter Hain
Peter Hain used to talk a lot of sense, but appears to have been losing his marbles somewhat of late.  He’s too outspoken for his own good, and I don’t think this job will fit him particularly well.

Minister for Housing: Yvette Cooper
Ed Balls’s other half.  I’m not sure what I make of her, in all honesty.

Minister for Children and Youth Justice: Beverley Hughes
An impressive number of ‘e’s in that name. I haven’t been concentrating enough to understand how her job differs all that much from Ed Balls’s.  Let’s hope she has.

Minister for Africa, Asia and the UN: Lord Malloch Brown
A fascinating appointment from outside of Westminster.  The former UN Deputy Secretary General, it will be interesting to see what he gets up to.  Perhaps shows that Gordon is taking Africa seriously – or at least trying to appear that way.

Minister for the Olympics and London: Tessa Jowell
As already mentioned, a role which appears to overlap considerably with Purnell’s.  But her unashamed buddyness with Ken Livingstone should work well.

Attorney General: Lady Scotland
Can only hope that she does a better job than Lord Goldsmith… and it looks like she might be.  Certainly seems to be more of a high-flyer.

Deputy PM: No-one
The fact that no-one needs to take over from John Prescott rather confirms what we already knew: He hasn’t been doing anything of use for months.

So there you go… that’s pretty much what I think of the new gang, right now.  It’ll probably change in about five minutes’ time.

I’m particularly glad to see the backs of John ‘attack dog’ Reid and Mad Pat, but I’m sure this new bunch will have some equally annoying characters.  It kinda reminds me of Big Brother – except we let this bunch of misfits run the country, and there’s only an eviction every four years, and even then it’s David Dimbleby at the helm rather than Davina screaming at us.  Though there’s an idea for Channel 4 next election night…

And if reports are to be believed, the next election night might be earlier than we thought – next year, perhaps.  If that happens, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Brown win.  Interesting times ahead.

So, Mr Blair’s out. He’s swapped Prime Ministership to be Steward and Bailiff of the Three Hundreds of Chiltern. Technically, at least. But really, he’s off to be an envoy in the Middle East. Because, of course, everybody respects everything Mr Blair’s done in the Middle East. Especially Iraq.

The best comment I’ve seen summing up Mr Blair’s premiership came, unusually, from Tony Parsons, when he was asked to sum up Blair’s ten years in ten words:

Somebody else’s villa in Barbados. Somebody else’s son in Iraq.

For me, it sums up perfectly the relaxed, celebrity, sofa-style of government – and the terrible ultimate consequence that’s overshadowed everything good he’s done. It’s pure Greek tragedy.

A pro-Europe Conservative MP defected to Labour, delivering a resignation letter that contained stinging criticism of the Conservative Party leader. But you already know that: It happened two-and-a-half years ago.

But early this morning, it happened again, with Quentin Davies, a rather less impressive Parliamentarian, playing the role of Robert Jackson.

And guess what? I think the same now as I did back then:

I do think that it’s rather unfortunate that MPs are allowed to do this. They get elected with the backing of one party, using their policies to convince the electorate to vote for them, and once they’ve got their seat they defect to another party with (theoretically) opposing views. It really isn’t on.

I feel that the most honest thing for Mr Jackson Davies to do in these circumstances would be to resign as a Conservative MP, triggering a by-election in which he should restand as a Labour MP, giving the electorate a representative with whose party line they agree. But he wouldn’t want to do that, because he might be defeated.

You’ll note that Mr Blair, back in 2005, was ‘delighted’ at Mr Jackson’s defection. And now, Mr Brown is, erm, ‘delighted’ by Mr Davies’ defection.

Who says there are no new ideas in politics?

I have mused repeatedly and often on this site about how many of the country’s top politicians have been sacked or have resigned in the past for unprofessional or improper behaviour, perhaps best exemplified by the way David Blunkett managed to resign from Government twice within twelve months. It’s revolving door politics, which just looks bizarre to anyone outside the political world.

Is there any other job on Earth where you can be fired and shortly thereafter rehired by the same organisation? I’m all for second chances, but when you’re a public servant in a Government which claims to be ‘whiter-than-white’, surely it’s a matter of honour that once you’ve done something so improper that you are forced out of your job, you don’t put yourself back in such a post.

Yet, over in the parallel universe that is the world of the Labour Party, Harriet Harman, who was sacked in 1998 after a thoroughly unprofessional public argument with Frank Fields over public service reform, has now been elected Deputy Party Leader. Madness.

Of course, two years prior to her undignified sacking, she was embroiled in another scandal when she chose to send her own children to a selective school, whilst advocating the abolition of selection for the rest of the nation’s children, in an impressive ‘Well it’s good enough for your children, but not for mine’ move.

It’s difficult to see how anybody is supposed to have confidence in her, given her past record, I’ve really no idea.

Also, I’d like to point out that I’m one of the few political bloggers not to have wrongly predicted a win for Alan Johnson – or, indeed, like Sky News, have reported it as fact for some considerable time. But then again, since I made no prediction, I guess it would’ve been difficult for me to be wrong. 😉

This morning, The Guardian reveals that Mr Brown and Sir Menzies have been having talks about Lib Dems potentially featuring in Mr Brown’s cabinet, when he announces it next Wednesday. It’s an interesting plan. It would, of course, be fantastic to see two parties working together despite their differences, for the good of the country. It would be a laudable example of rising above party politics. But I can’t see it happening, because I can’t see the advantage for the Lib Dems.

It’s clear what’s in it for Labour: A virtually guaranteed win at the next election, an appearance of true cross-party working, and some very capable ministers.

But what’s in it for the Lib Dems? They lose the power to properly attack the government, they will inevitably be blamed for blunders while Labour takes the credit for successes, and it damages any perception anyone might have had of them as a potential government in their own right. They lose the advantages of opposition, without really gaining any real influence. They would also lose a certain degree of advantage when it comes to negotiations for a coalition government following the next election, should one be necessary.

Media speculation that this might happen, however, is very clearly beneficial to both parties. It paints Mr Brown as someone willing to break with tradition and party politics in order to find the right people for the right jobs, and it paints the Lib Dems as a party taken seriously enough for it’s shadow ministers to be considered for the top jobs.

If nothing comes of the speculation, really no political damage is done to Mr Brown, but it allows the Lib Dems to harp on about turning down potential power in favour of standing up for their principles – or else, they could both deny that the talks ever took place, which would be even less damaging to Mr Brown, and of no harm or benefit to Sir Menzies – so they’d both have gained a free bit positive media coverage.

So I reckon the mutually beneficial media speculation is as far as this will go. Sir Menzies isn’t a fool, and I can’t see him agreeing to something that would move his party backwards. But he and Mr Brown are good friends, and there’s every reason to think that they might have put their heads together and hatched this plan which gives them both a bit of good PR – great for Mr Brown as he’s entering the job, and great for Sir Menzies to help quieten the mutterings about him in his own party.

I don’t see a Lib Dem in next week’s cabinet. But I’d be delighted to be proved wrong.

A week ago today, Alastair Campbell gave a comprehensive and well-argued defence of Tony Blair’s speech about the modern media.

Whilst I don’t agree with Mr Campbell, much of what he says in his post is interesting, and I’d strongly urge you to read the whole thing. But I just wanted to pull out this little bit:

The PM went through some of the many changes that we put in place when I was at Number 10 to try to improve things. On the record briefings, Freedom of Information, TB’s monthly press conferences … Nick Robinson made a very revealing comment about this a while back … The trouble was, he said, that TB was so good at them they became boring. In other words, unless the elected politician was screwing up, saying something hugely controversial, or fitting into the media’s preordained agenda, they can cut to some pimply youth in Downing Street telling you what the politician actually meant.

You’ll note that Alastair Campbell thinks Blair was good because he wasn’t controversial. He thinks that the fact that Mr Blair never says anything to offend anyone is a good thing. It’s an interesting point of view.

If your aim in life is to get elected and stay elected – power for power’s sake – then never doing anything to offend anyone is clearly the best way forward. If you want to get elected because you have real beliefs, and you want to change the country for the better, then you’re going to have to tread on some toes.

Undoubtedly, Tony Blair has trodden on toes. But wouldn’t he be a much better PM if he engaged with the issues, and argued for his point of view, rather than saying nothing controversial, not engaging with the argument, and just using a huge Parliamentary majority to perform his wishes whilst never offending anyone?

Is it not better to engage the electorate and convince them of your argument, rather than merely placating them? Sure, you’ll alienate sections of the population, but you’ll have a loyal following of those who believe in your cause, and who support you because they believe you’re doing the right thing, rather than supporting you because you ‘don’t seem too bad’.

It might be the bigger political risk, but surely it’s the more noble course – and certainly not indicative of ‘screwing up’.

The greatest politicians are, almost without exception, divisive in their time – either in their country or their party. Thatcher and Churchill are probably the greatest Prime Ministers of the 20th Century, yet both were controversial in their own way. They certainly offended people – and it changed the country (arguably) for the better.

Have we really come to a situation where the hunger for power is such that our politicians want it for its own sake? Have we really come so far from political idealism? I fear so, but dearly hope not.

Since last Thursday, when the story of the refusal of Tul Bahadur Pun’s immigration application broke, I’ve been contacted by a quite extraordinary range of people asking me to support his appeal – from people I’ve never met, to fellow bloggers, to personal friends, to TV presenters. Mr Pun has, intentionally or otherwise, become the cause célèbre of students, social networkers, and bloggers nationwide (examples: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10), but I’m not so sure about his case.

Tul Bahadur Pun is an 84 year-old Nepalese citizen. He’s lived in Nepal for most of his life, and, like may 84 year-olds, has developed a collection of medical conditions – in his case, heart problems, asthma, and diabetes. In his home country of Nepal, medication is not regularly available for his consumption, and so he’d like to move to Britain.

Mr Pun has no family in Britain. He has no-one to support him. He wants to move here to use the services of the NHS, and no doubt rely on Social Services for his social requirements. He is the classical immigrant ‘drain on society’ that the Daily Mail is forever seeking to vilify.

Yet a huge amount of support has surrounded Mr Pun’s case, as he fought for 18 years with the Indian Army and was awarded the Victoria Cross for his efforts with the allied forces during the Second World War. Does that entitle him to British citizenship? By current immigration rules? No. Morally? I’m not sure.

If you read around his case, you’ll come across a lot of emotive stuff about him being denied entry to Britain on the basis that he ‘failed to demonstrate strong ties to the UK’. In immigration terms, this means he’ll be reliant on the state, and so saying that receipt of the VC ‘demonstrates strong ties’ is misleading. You’ll also note that this was only one of several reasons why his application was denied, another being that it was not demonstrated that regular medication would actually improve his condition. Try to find the full text of his rejection has beaten me, which makes it difficult to make an informed judgement on the case.

But more sinister about the whole campaign for which Mr Pun has become the poster-boy is that thousands of people are being urged to sign a Downing Street petition calling for all Ghurkas to have the right to come and settle in the UK. People who support this one individual case are being urged to support a campaign that has quite different aims to merely allowing Mr Pun access to healthcare. It’s extrapolation from one emotive case to the cases of many, and however sympathetic I might feel towards Mr Pun, the underhand way in which his lawyers are playing this game is despicable.

If we open our doors to all Ghurkas, who else are we to admit? Is every US soldier that has served alongside British comrades in Iraq to be entitled to NHS care because of the shocking state of medical care in their home country? And besides, why are we limiting ourselves to those who have made a military contribution to the country? Are there not many others who’ve made an equally large contribution, with equally large personal sacrifice, who deserve citizenship too? I’m sure as Brits we have plenty of our own examples of Clara Maass, but our national obsession with remembering and honouring militarian sacrifices means that they are tragically forgotten. Many, many people risk their lives for the good of this country day after day – only the tiniest proportion of them are military personnel.

Mr Pun fought for the wellbeing of a grateful nation, and did so with exceptional bravery. Nonetheless, he did so voluntarily, of his own free will. He now has health problems unrelated to his service, but would like something back from the country for which he gave so much. I’m not sure we’re morally obliged to provide it, but it seems mean-spirited at best to deny citizenship and care to the exceptional Mr Pun, and I will make those views known to the relevant people in the relevant ways.

But who else, out of the thousands of people who apply for immigration each year, is exceptional? How do we define who ‘deserves’ our help and who doesn’t? The fact is, we condemn an awful lot of people to receiving poor medical care every year, and every one of those cases is a tragedy – but a necessary tragedy if we want to retain the level of health and social care we universally provide to citizens of our fine country.

The question is not about Mr Pun, and certainly not about allowing Mr Pun and all of his comrades have open access to the UK. The question is much bigger than that. And I have no answers.

Gordon Brown has enough nominations to ensure that he will not face a challenger for the Labour leadership. So now he has to fight a six-week election against, erm, nobody. To me, that seems a bit silly. But maybe that’s why I’m not a politician.

This morning, Tony Blair was ‘delighted’ to back Gordon Brown as the next Prime Minister. I bet it hurt, and probably stuck in his throat a little. Nothing could have pained him more.

So not surprising, then, that Blair decided to get back at Brown by scheduling a speech for the same time as Brown’s campaign launch. It’s no accident – Alistair Campbell’s famed grid system tells us that. It’s clearly a spoiler.

Yesterday, Andrew Neil was practically running a book on when Blair’s first coded jibe about Blair would happen, and one commentator suggested it would be today. Looks like he was right.

Everybody with the ability to communicate appears to be commenting today on Tony Blair’s legacy today, after he announced that he would resign on 27th July.

It’s easy to point out that he’s buried bad news to the end, choosing to use the day of an interest rate rise to announcing his ‘departure timetable’, something perhaps more familiar to a steam train than a politician. Not to mention the burying of the news that the cost of the ID card scheme has increased by £840m.

It’s easy to point out that he’s the King of Soundbites to the end: “The best nation on Earth”.

It’s easy to point out that his departure had the same theme tune as his arrival, Things Can Only Get Better, and wonder when it was most true.

It’s all-to-easy for people like me to knock Blair’s achievement. We can criticise him for his sofa-style of government, his five wars, his failures.

But for all his faults, he is the first Labour Leader to secure three successive election victories. He has introduced policies which have made the country better – the minimum wage being a case in point. He is the first ‘celebrity’ Prime Minister. And he’s a very successful politician.

His legacy will be the war in Iraq – his biggest failure. His defence of his less successful policies – “I did what I thought was right” – reveals, perhaps, his biggest failing: Government should not take decisions based upon the whim of the Prime Minister – however well intentioned – but on the facts, considered opinion from experts in their field, Cabinet discussion and debate, and Parliamentary process.

It’s a legacy, but not, I think, the one he wanted.