Fraser Nelson

Should celebrities stand to become MPs? I have just done a phone-in on Richard Bacon's Five Live programme where I was in favour of it. My point was that voting in someone like Esther Rantzen sends an important democratic message: that the voters think the Westminster menu is uninspiring. This is an entirely legitimate means of democratic protest. But, Bacon asked, don't you think they have that message? Well yes, but they only really take action if there is an electoral price to pay. Independent candidates are thorns in a traditional politician's side. And often they prompt action - think about the effect of the Referendum Party. It's not impossible that the celebs come good. Who would have thought an actor like Reagan would have been such a transformative politician?

Standard & Poor has just become the first credit rating agency to downgrade the UK from a "stable" assessment to "negative" - and given that the Tory borrowing proposals until 2014 are virtually identical to Labour's, it is a warning that should chill Cameron. It's feasible to fund your government with IOU notes now, with the Bank of England printing money to buy them, and a global flight-to-safety making a bull market in bonds. But after the next election, with equity markets recovering and the QE policy exhausted, how will Cameron find buyers for the £150bn a year debt he currently envisages issuing? The S&P note is not public, but I reprint here what it has told clients. Note it has not altered its AAA status, just its rhetotic and overall position.

The IMF has published its verdict on Britain - who it may very well be bailing out in the next couple of years - and a suspiciously warm phrase is up there, and being singled out by government spin doctors: "The UK government response to the global financial crisis has been "bold and wide-ranging," adding that "aggressive action" by the government succeeded in containing the crisis and avoiding a breakdown. So what's up? First, this is an Article IV report from the IMF and, as such, it has to be "agreed" with the government. So it’s not really independent – this format limits how honest it can be, and vastly expands the ability of the government to get in a line it can spin to the newspapers.

Was that it? Gordon Brown spent an hour talking about "radical action," "radical surgery," and the like. So what's he doing? Setting up a committee. Or, more accurately, publishing a consultation paper on setting up a committee; one that would monitor MPs' pay and expenses. And does anyone seriously believe it will come down harshly on MPs who, on £63k a year, are already amongst the best paid politicians in the world? Or does he envisage a conversation in the Dog & Duck: "I was really angry about those MPs, but then Gordon set up this committee". Brown can't stop repeating how he is the "first Prime Minister" to suggest it. In his head, it may be radical, up there with 1832 and 1867. But this shows a man still operating on the wavelength of the Westminster Village.

So will David Cameron ride the wave of anti-politics or be crushed by it? I have for years thought that trends towards people power and away from hierarchies - in every sphere of life - shows the world is moving the conservative way and that the idea of a big government belongs in the last century. This morning, someone forwarded me a memo from James Frayne, who won the referendum on the north-east assembly for the No campaign by tapping into the anti politics vote. Frayne is now at Portland PR, for whom the memo was written. I suspect he won't thank me for publishing it - but it seems in keeping with this new age of transparency to do so, and I thought CoffeeHousers may be interested as it raises some good points.

If our MPs keep paying back the expenses they claimed at the current rate we'll have the national debt down in no time. What strikes me about ex-Labour chairman Ian McCartney is that even the prospect of having his claims made public led him to reach for his cheque book and refund £16,000 of our money that he'd helped himself to - on the likes of champagne flutes and decorating. He wrote a hilarious letter to the Fees Office last July. "In the light of reforms debated and implemented by a resolution of the House on July 3, 2008 I have been looking at my claims to ensure that I am satisfied in their accuracy," he said. Except that was a lie, because he did know they were, as he puts it, "accurate and allowable and was deemed as such by your department at the time.

Brown looked dejected, buffeted and battered by events. Cameron looked confident, in charge of them. The Tory leader kicked off asking why all new claims can’t be put online? (Ben Wallace did so ages ago, and was hated by many in his party, but Cameron backed him). Brown’s response was in auto-garble, speaking as if reading the small print from an insurance advert. "We need to have outside bodies" – what difference in the language they use. Problem is, the second homes allowance is just one scam. Cameron then went to another one: what about the “communications allowance?” It’s a mechanism to allow Labour MPs in marginal seats to respond to Lord Ashcroft’s marginal seat campaign funding.