It was bound to happen, given the febrile end-of-term atmosphere at Westminster. MPs are talking up the prospect of Michael Portillo defecting to the Labour Party. Superficially, it looks right. A flight to the arms of inclusive, liberal-minded Tony Blair, who would bind up his wounds over Section 28 and all-cannabis (maybe that should be all-women) shortlists. Ken Clarke has publicly asked Portillo to "reconsider" his resignation from the shadow cabinet, but he doesn't want him to return for a year or two, by when the aspiring Caudillo would be the day before yesterday's man. So the notion has some wistful attractions. And he did begin as a boy Labourite. So why can't I believe a word of it?

Peter Mandelson has managed to find another route back into No 10. His personal spin-doctor, Patrick Diamond, who plainly has a lot of time on his hands, has been hired to write a policy paper on public-private provision for Downing Street. Quite what the denizens of Blair Towers hope to learn from this 24-year-old arriviste is unclear.

Which is the highest-paid married couple in the House of Commons? Peter and Virginia Bottomley? Nicholas and Ann Winterton? Andrew Mackay and Julie Kirkbride? No. Try Peter and Iris Robinson, DUP members for Belfast East and Strangford respectively. They each get the parliamentary salary of £53,000 a year, plus allowances that virtually triple this figure. In addition, they are both MLAs - members of the Northern Ireland Legislative Assembly - with salaries in excess of £40,000 and an extra tranche of allowances. Some estimates put their joint package at half a million pounds a year, but that sounds like an exaggeration of a kind unknown in the propaganda of the DUP.

MPs have gone home for their 12-week holiday (how they hate it being so described) filled with wrath about Ken Livingstone's proposed £5-a-day congestion tax. They do not figure on his list of exemptions, unlike "most" military vehicles, which must include the Defence Secretary, Geoff Hoon, but not members of the defence select committee. Many indigent Labour members live south of the river. There are four in my block off the Walworth Road alone, tantalisingly outside Ken's inner-city box. So MPs, who enjoy free reserved parking places at Westminster, are discreetly lobbying to be spared the Livingstone car tax. Alternatively, they would be happy to have the charge reimbursed by the Fees Office, aka the taxpayer.

The current edition of Progress, the glossy, mysteriously funded Blairite magazine, contains no fewer than 13 pictures of the Great Helmsman. But the worm appears to be turning. The new editorial calls for the leadership's iron discipline over the party to loosen. Sad, then, that Charles Clarke, the imposed Labour chairman, rules in an interview that Ken Livingstone cannot be readmitted to the party until he has served five years in the wilderness.

A good response to my competition for a new title for Comrade Clarke. He candidly admits that "the question of what title I have and how that operates is always a delicate question".

I'll say. R J Brian of Cheddleton suggests he should be known as the Fat Controller, but alas he already is. Darrell Barnes of London recommends "Il Commendatore", because he returns as the agent of divine retribution on the wayward behaviour of Don Giovanni and others like him, particularly Labour backbenchers. Nick (or is it Mick?) Mill of Basildon proposes "Intendant", or "Intendant-General", which would confuse most conference delegates. Robin Hill of Sevenoaks cruelly offers the "Stool-pigeon", and Martin Green thinks he should be called the "Party Panjandrum". The palm, though, goes to Jodie Soame for her suggestion of "Chief Clerk".

This column now takes a break until the week of the Trades Union Congress.

Paul Routledge is chief political commentator for the Mirror

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