"A Vote For Jade Goody Would Be Electoral Suicide" - Blears

Regular readers will know that I like to spend the odd evening curled up in front of the TV watching Big Brother. It's not surprising this is one of my favourite TV programmes (after Higgledy House and The Roly Mo Show), because I was a housemate myself once.

My interest is particularly heightened when the series features an intellectually stimulating and politically sophisticated female contestant (especially one with good sized love handles like my old favourite Aisleyne).

So under normal circumstances I'd be rooting for the attractive and intelligent Jade Goody (right). Except, of course, that her behaviour on camera has reached the level I normally associate with LibDems.

The subject occupied most of last night's "Question Time" and I really enjoyed watching my good friend and fellow Chief Whip - the MP for Redditch, Inkberrow & Cookhill - showing how to reply to a question without actually answering it, in that smooth, effortless manner that everyone has come to associate with us in New Labour (although Tony has been creaking a bit under the interview pressure lately).

After Jacqui had declared that the racist bullying in the programme was completely unacceptable and should not be seen on our TV screens, Dimbleby asked her: "So you think it should be taken off?", to which she replied: "I think... I mean... I think... I think Tessa [Jowell] is right that it's for TV companies to make their decisions." It was a masterful performance, very reminiscent of our approach to criminality, local authorities and ASBOs ("Tough On Crime, Whatsit On Something Or Other"). As you can see from the screen shot, Jacqui's steadfastness under interrogation was despite aggressive bullying from David Dimbleby who at one stage threatened to punch her! I'm coming more and more round to the conclusion that she would make a damned fine Deputy Prime Minister!

What really got my goat was the Tory BBC keeping Jacqui waiting for a full 7 minutes to make her comments, while both Edwina Currie and David Davis (who hadn't even seen Celebrity Big Brother!) were allowed on first to make their trivialising comments. The only positive side to the programme was that the ghastly half-libertarian half-wolfman Shami Chakrabarti was kept waiting even longer before being allowed to start her 20-minute rant.

So, normally we'd be promoting someone like Jade in order to benefit from the spin off, as Tony did with his brilliant Cool Britannia campaign a few years back. But this time I must agree with the Chief Whip that a vote for Jade Goody would be electoral suicide and - despite the fact that she's far too skinny for my tastes - cast my vote for that Indian woman whose name I can't remember.