And another thing…

There’s no turning back for David Davies. He has applied for (and presumably been granted) the Stewardship of the Chiltern Hundreds, thus disqualifying himself from membership of the House of Commons. The by-election will be held on 10 July.

I was wrong – he didn’t try to ask a question at PMQs, which begs the question, why did he wait until yesterday to resign and not just do it on Monday?

There’s no doubt DD will be grievously offended by the disdain in which the other parties – particularly Labour – hold him and his by-election. His only chance now of making a serious point is if he can secure a turnout which is significantly higher than the 70.2 per cent achieved in 2005. This will be difficult given the absence of a real contest. And if turnout is significantly lower than that, DD will have shown his gesture to have been not only empty, but very, very expensive.

The right wing is trying to depict Andy Burnham’s latest observations on DD as a “smear”. Apparently, any criticism of the Hero of Haltemprice is to be viewed in this way from now until 10 July.

Andy pointed out that he thought it strange that the Director of Liberty, the perpetually angry Shami Chakrabarti, should allow herself to be so publicly associated with a hanger and flogger. Where in that observation is the smear? That he is being supported by Ms Chakrabarti? That he is a supporter of capital punishment? These are all matters of public record and cannot, therefore, be described as “smear”.

Desperate for the publicity, however, and for the lifeline of some actual opposition in his one-man crusade, DD has leapt at the chance to depict himself as the victim. He said tonight that GB’s henchmen “were out and about to attack me personally rather than engage in rational debate. Labour has now resorted to personal smears and lies rather than make its case for 42-day detention.”

You wish, mate. Pointing out an often-repeated fact about DD’s political views is not a smear. I would bet him that DD’s personal circus is occupying little or no discussion time in Downing Street or, indeed, in any pub in the land.

David Davis has apparently decided to delay his much-heralded resignation from the Commons until after Prime Minister’s Questions today. Does that mean he intends to ask a question from the back benches? He won’t be on the order paper, so if that’s his intention he will have to bob up and down to try to catch the Speaker’s eye. And there’s no guarantee that Michael Martin will call him; DD has no more “right” to be called than any other backbencher, whatever the nature of his rather bizarre personal crusade he announced last week.

I’ve been invited by blushing newly-wed Iain Dale to be interviewed for his blog immediately afterwards, so will no doubt be offered an opportunity to comment further on DD’s last appearance in the chamber before the entirely pointless and unnecessary Haltemprice and Howden by-election gets underway.

I still haven’t come across a single Tory MP who can say the name “David Davis” without spitting. One normally mild-mannered Tory, when asked his view on it all, replied: “On the record, he’s a bloody idiot. Off the record, he’s a f***ing idiot!”

Yesterday, while waiting for my ministerial driver, Bob, to pick me up at Members’ Entrance, I spied DD and a journalist chatting in the middle of New Palace Yard. Bob had to swerve to avoid hitting him. “Watch out, David,” I called. “We don’t want any pointless by-elections, do we?”

“David Davis has challenged Gordon Brown to ‘come and defend’ his policies in a by-election he intends to fight on the issue of civil liberties.”

Yeah, I’ll bet he has.