Uk politics

The furore surrounding the defence secretary is distracting attention from some stories that are threatening the coalition’s tranquillity. Benedict Brogan reports that the Health Bill is being amended out of existence by a cabal of Lib Dem peers, a campaigned that was mooted during the party conference season. The rebellion is apparently aggravating Number 10, which understood that Nick Clegg had secured his party's support for the diluted programme which emerged after the recent "listening exercise". Labour's numerical superiority in the House of Lords means that ministers will have to be at their most mellifluous to bring the errant Lib Dems back to the fold, because Tory backbenchers are clear that they will not stomach further revisions.

The Liam Fox imbroglio has just started to make more sense. The original story was broken by The Guardian (of whom more later) and the main source appears to have been one Harvey Boulter, an American mogul whom Fox fatally agreed to meet in June at the suggestion of his friend Adam Werrity. It was the kind of meeting that a civil servant would never have arranged. Boulter was, to use a political term, toxic. He was being sued for blackmail by 3M, in a court case being fought in London, and after landing this meeting with the UK Defence Secretary he tried to use it as ammo.

This weekend's gossip is all about Liam Fox and his ministerial future. Ministers and journalists are calling each other, weighing the evidence, trying to find out the latest gossip. Nobody should underestimate the Defence Secretary's fight — he is an alumni of the school of hard knocks. But two things go against him. First, having annoyed many colleagues — not least in No 10 — not everyone is rushing to his defence, as they did during the suspicions that dogged William Hague. No.10 has now given him its "full backing," but, as history shows, that can mean anything from support to sayonara. David Cameron would prefer not to reshuffle his Cabinet, that's clear.

Chris Huhne has fallen into the Twitter direct message trap. I've done it myself.* When you think you're privately messaging someone then — horror! — it is broadcast to the world. In his case "From someone else fine but I do not want my fingerprints on the story C'" He deleted the tweet but — sorry, Chris! — that doesn't work on Twitter either because you can be retweeted. What's he up to? As a former Sunday newspaper journalist I have a fair idea. It's Friday night, 6pm — witching hour for MPs briefing a Sunday hack, with the intention of damaging a colleague or the government. "From someone else, fine" might well indicate asking the journalist to suggest the leak or quote came from someone else — so he could then deny all knowledge.

John Healey and John Denham have resigned from the shadow Cabinet ahead of Ed Miliband’s reshuffle. Healey is, officially, departing for family reasons. But I doubt that many of those closest to Miliband will particularly mind his departure. I expect that Miliband may also take this chance to move Andy Burnham, who knows the health brief from his time in government and is an effective if one dimensional media performer, from education into the health brief. These two resignations free up a couple of the big shadow Cabinet jobs as Miliband prepares to shuffle his pack. It is almost certain that the Labour leader, who has just won himself complete control over shadow Cabinet appointments, will promote members of the 2010 intake to the full shadow Cabinet.