More 4 news interviews Iain Dale on Prescott and Blogs

This time he gets in with the point that we(the bloggers) pay the libel bills (haven't seen anyone pay yet ..) - where as the MSM expenses the fines.

A bit more time on the subject - a bit better than Newsnight.

Iain talking about breaking the conspiracy of silence amongst the lobby journalists. The MSM guy (turns out to be John Lloyd of the financial times) there admits as much, but makes a slightly confused point on privacy. Iain correctly points out the issue is about hypocrisy - Prescott attacked the Tories for sleaze in the early NuLabour days.

This is more focusing on the private life side - Iain tries to point out Guido helpful pushing of the cash for peerages issue up the news agenda ;-).

In short Iain does very well for us bloggers, he's more relaxed than on Newsnight and had quick answers to the obvious questions.

I still however have this feeling that before too long the dark forces in NuLabour
are going to want to really hang a blogger out to dry. Remember what the tried to do to patients complaining about the NHS !

(PDA thumb typing again - spelling to be sorted later ;-)

Update: On the complaints from NuLabour and the friends of Prescott see this extract written by Alice Thonson in the Daily Telegraph 13/09/05.(highlighting is mine ) This is how normal people and public servants get treated by NuLabour. (Of course they aren't any more gentle on their official political opponents either. )

Remember Rose Addis, the elderly hospital patient who dared to say that her treatment on the NHS was unacceptable? She was called a racist. The victims of the Paddington rail crash were derided. Black Rod was dismissed as a closet Tory for confirming that Downing Street had tried to muscle in on the Queen Mother's funeral. Dame Elizabeth Filkin, the former parliamentary standards commissioner, was vilified for expecting ministers to stick to the Commons' rules. Ruth Lea, now director of the Centre for Policy Studies, was sacked from the Institute of Directors after being too critical. "It was terrifying: Number 10 went out of its way to exterminate me," she says. "I can't have been very significant but they did everything they could to paint me as a mad Mrs Rochester."

At times it has seemed as though this Government is more interested in pursuing personal vendettas than running the country. The public first realised the extent to which the Government would go after September 11, when Jo Moore's memo suggesting it was a good day to bury bad news was leaked. But it wasn't until the Iraq war that they began to take notice. The way that advisers went after the scientist Dr David Kelly was ruthless, even though his concerns about weapons of mass destruction later turned out to be well-founded. When he committed suicide in an Oxfordshire wood, it was clear they had gone too far. But they can't seem to stop themselves. During the general election, when Mr Campbell came back from semi-retirement, they sent out undercover spies to bring down as many Tories as they could by catching them off message.

Also see an old-but not that old Prescott Speech here - extract below: ( if you read it all you see his side swipe about sounding like a Steve Norris chat up line )

Then after 17 years of this Tory government, they have the audacity to talk about morality.

Did you hear John Major on the Today programme? - calling for ethics to come back into the political debate?

I'm told some Tory MPs think ethics is a county near Middlesex. It's a bit hard to take: John Major - ethics man.

The Tories have redefined unemployment they have redefined poverty. Now they want to redefine morality.

For too many Tories, morality means not getting caught.