Jowell 's calm before the storm
Don't hold your breath for Tessa Jowell's Commons appearance this afternoon. The rules of parliamentary question time limit MPs to asking about questions that have already been tabled. You'll be delighted to hear that these include:
- If she will make a statement on the support her department is giving to rugby league.
- What discussions she has had with the Office of Fair Trading and the Department for Trade and Industry on the distribution arrangements for newspapers and magazines.
- If she will intervene to ensure that the portrait of John Donne in the National Portrait Gallery is not lost to the nation.
The official opposition line - led by David Cameron - is to look and sound sympathetic whilst insisting she still has questions to answer. The Tories are content to let the media and the odd Labour MP cause trouble. Thus, it's unlikely that Tessa Jowell will get anything other than a warm reaction today. She is experienced enough though to know that this will not prove her troubles are at an end.
The key to that is whether new questions being asked about her mortgage and her husband's share dealings suggest that she did after all breach the ministerial code or, indeed, Commons rules on declaring interests. The Italian prosecutors may yet add more to the pot.
Margaret Beckett has turned this into a trial of strength with the media, calling it "a kind of witch-hunt and it ought not to go on" and declaring that her colleague has a duty to tough this out "If she can stand it". The next couple of days will see if "she can stand it" and she will have her eyes on the unofficial deadline for ministerial resignations - Wednesday.
Why? Because Tony Blair wants things neat and tidy before standing up for Prime Minister's Question Time.
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