Matthew Dancona

In County Wexford on the South East coast of Ireland for the wedding of Number Ten strategist and Beatles fanatic, Steve Morris, to his beautiful bride, Tara Hopkins - complete with video congratulations beamed to the reception from Tony Blair, perhaps the last such message he will send while Prime Minister. I was also impressed that Steve, one of the best and brightest Downing Street officials, had even persuaded the parish priest to include a prayer for our "political and civil leaders" in the service. That's joined-up government for you.

There is plenty of baffled commentary in this morning's newspapers about the strange US-style transition arrangements between the Blair and Brown regimes - see for instance this leader in the Guardian. There is also still more on who will do what in Gordon's court, who's in, who's out. But the definitive piece remains Fraser's one on the Brownite "Octet" in the Spectator last September.

Further to what James posted on John McDonnell, I have always thought that Gordon wanted a leftwing candidate to run. It provides him with the illusion of a contest and enables him to posture as the New Labour continuity contender. This line-up will give comfort to the Blairites who have rushed on to the Brown-wagon, and declared implausibly that they have aways believed that Gordon was a reformer. Beyond that, the contest will establish nothing and do nothing to avert Labour's coming civil war.

Stand by for a huge constitutional debate: that was one of many messages to be drawn from Gordon Brown’s launch this morning. Asked whether his plans included a written constitution, he would only say that he favoured a “better constitution”. But there was an explicit promise to curb the Crown prerogative, make Parliament more powerful, submit certain government appointments to parliamentary oversight, and (less overtly) entrench citizens’ rights and responsibilities in some way. Gordon left us is no doubt that he is thinking big. To make sense of it all, check out this excellent section of the openDemocracy website.

Matthew d'Ancona and Tim Montgomerie of Conservative Home debate what the Tories can--and should--learn from Blair.    Dear Tim,Here is my starter for ten.Tony Blair is already transforming Tory politics. Here are few of the lessons that are being learned (or should be):1. Economics is no longer enough. The 1997 election result showed that growth no longer guarantees electoral victory – indeed, now that the Bank of England is independent, voters have every reason to think that they are prosperous in spite of rather than because of politicians. Cameron and Osborne are right to emphasise “economic stability”: code for “We won’t ruin it.” 2. Quality of life:  making ends meet is still a struggle for millions of people.

Nobody knows what Blair will say tomorrow in his constituency. But this is what he will mean: “People of Sedgefield: in 1983 you were fortunate enough to elect me your MP – no, stop crying at the back, the weepy bit doesn’t come till later. Anyway, I have been in the Commons for 24 years when I could have been coining it at the bar. Makes you think, doesn’t it? Still, I stuck with it, all those ghastly branch meetings and terrible activists, and became Labour leader in 1994. Again – well chosen! And, just to remind you ungrateful lot – since then, I’ve won you three elections, loads of wars and seen off four Tory leaders. And what thanks have I got? A coup last September to get rid of me, that’s what.

When John Major was at his most paranoid, he used to have every edition of the Evening Standard brought to him by a flunky in his study - whereupon he would jab at the page and blame specific colleagues for specific leaks. In his final months, Iain Duncan Smith acquired a similar habit, saying to Tory frontbenchers: "I see you got a good write up on page 23, paragraph four" - or words to that effect. So this interesting piece on Gordon and the press does not inspire confidence.

I started the day unsure that the political landscape had changed but 12 hours is a long time in politics. Few moments deserve to be called historic, but the fall of Scotland to the SNP is amongst them. In theory this brings Scottish independence closer than at any time since the Home Rule Bill of 1913. But its greater significance is personal. However he wriggles and squirms, Gordon Brown cannot escape the tartan brush with which he has just been rudely tarred. Scotland was meant to be his fiefdom and it has fallen out of Labour hands – just as Dunfermline and West Fife, which Labour lost in a by-election in February 2006, was meant to be Mr Brown’s back-yard. Could there be a worse way to begin a premiership?