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A selection of lines from parliamentary sketch-writers.

The Commons science committee was grilling two witnesses from polar opposites of the climate change debate. First up was former chancellor Lord Lawson of Blaby, a longstanding critic of the climate policy. Then it was the turn of Professor Phil Jones, the scientist from the University of East Anglia who was at the centre of the leaked e-mails controversy.

that the former chancellor's many years' experience as a politician were apparent in the way he handled the committee's questions:

"With the aggression of someone who used to go eyeball to eyeball with Margaret Thatcher, Lawson laid about the 'climate alarmists' and, without naming Jones, spoke with dripping contempt."

that Professor Jones's demeanour was reminiscent of Dr David Kelly in front of the foreign affairs select committee several years ago:

"His voice quavered, hands shook, eyes darted as though he was watching a video of Wimbledon on fast-forward."

However, that the scientist seemed uneasy, describing him as "eerily calm":

"He seemed, like a dead calm sea, almost glassy. And, like ships in the Bermuda Triangle, questions that got near him just seemed to disappear."

that the committee was out to get Professor
Jones:

"They may be looking for a blood sacrifice. If I were Dr Jones, I'd get the details of a transfusion service."

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