The bank holiday found me trying (unsuccessfully) to cast a line on the Tweed - not an activity you'd associate with the New Statesman, salmon fishing being more a Spectator sport. But now John Prescott has shown the way on the croquet lawn, the rest of us must do our best to keep up. "I've not seen you on the box for a while," said the gillie, as he rowed me out to the appointed spot. "Is that you retired, then?" Stupidly - though appropriately, given the circumstances - I rose to the bait, protesting that the past year had been one of my busiest ever and I was feeling knackered. "Aye well," he said, "ah wouldnae know; ah dinnae watch television anyway."

That was my first lesson: having spent a lifetime luring salmon on to the bait, my companion was equally adept at reeling in vain performers. The second lesson was more fascinating. As another hour passed on the river, a friend told me about a remarkable piece of duck behaviour he'd observed.

The duck in question had a newly hatched group of ducklings in tow, and whenever my friend got too close, the mother feigned an injury to her wing, swimming away from the rest of her brood and exciting my friend's curiosity. The "injured wing" trick was designed to attract attention on to the adult duck and allow the little ones to escape unharmed.

At that moment I understood the point of John Prescott, and the reason why it is so important for Tony Blair to hold on to him. The more we focus on the Deputy Prime Minister, now indisputably a lame duck, the less attention we give to what's going on elsewhere in the government. If 11 September was a good day to bury bad news, the Prescott affair has provided a smokescreen as dense as the DPM himself. The attention switches to the minutiae of the new Labour court; who's in, who's out, who's shaking it all about.

(That'll be Prescott, then.)

But even that could not obscure the events at the Home Office, now under new management. It's somehow fitting that having vowed to work 18 hours a day to sort it out, John Reid disappeared on holiday the following week. Not that he shouldn't: God knows, the department will need a more refreshed minister than the gnarled Rottweiler who appeared in front of the select committee to pronounce his department "unfit for purpose". It's just that having failed to send more than 1,000 foreign criminals out of the country, it's ironic that they couldn't keep the Home Secretary in it. Until the lure of a photo op brought him back.

It was typical Blair to hit back with a new crackdown on foreign criminals. I was pleased that the indefatigable Shami Chakrabarti and others pointed out that this policy - let's call it the "Stable Door (Closing) Bill 2006" - is illegal and impractical. The problem is not that they need new laws, but that they are so incompetent at administering the old ones.

Downing Street is coming to resemble the bridge of the Starship Enterprise, or Starship Compromised.

There’s Tony Blair, his mission: to boldly go where Labour has never been before (foundation hospitals, trust schools). This headlong, reckless ambition is starting to worry Scotty, the hard-working chief engineer, who bursts on to the bridge at regular intervals to remonstrate. ("She cannae take any more, captain!") But the skipper’s having none of it. With Margaret "Uhura" Beckett at his side and Peter "Spock" Mandelson lurking in the background ("Very logical, captain"), Blair urges the ship on. "Step it up to warp factor seven! Set Civil Liberties to stun!" As the sprockets start to pop and the crew mutters mutinously, Captain Blair summons the engineer. "Scotty, how long would you need to build up enough steam to win the next election?" "About three years, cap’n." A pause. Blair tells him: "I’ll give you ten months." Scotty swallows his pride, as he always does. "Ah’ll do ma best."

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