Opponents can't have it both ways. Either there is no demand for civil partnerships for straight couples or it will be very expensive. But it can't be both.

You can spot the government panic a mile off. Terrified that the amendment being voted on in the Commons today will derail gay marriage legislation, they are throwing everything but the kitchen sink at it.

Most Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs believe in allowing straight couples to have civil partnerships at the same time as allowing gay couples to marry. Tory MPs – up to 100 of which may support the amendment today – are late converts. Or rather, they are not converts at all. They are dinosaurs prepared to vote for anything in a bid to delay or even destroy the gay marriage bill.

Equalities minister Maria Miller has come out with guns blazing. Her department estimates a £4 billion price tag in access to public sector pensions if straight couples can have civil partnerships. Or they do now, at least. A week ago the price tag was £3

Does anyone remember the band ‘Vanilla’? They were a girl group from North London who released the single ‘No Way No Way’ in 1997 – reaching number 14 in the charts.
 
Still no? Let me jog your memory with some of the lyrics:
‘No way, no way
Ma na ma na,
Don’t get fresh with me’
 
STILL no? Oh well – they did only have two singles, after all.
 
The song was released when I was 13 years old, and I remember thinking ‘Surely this is some kind of sick joke – unleashing such revolting dreck on us teenagers and expecting us to lap it up’. It promptly won the dubious title of "Worst Music Video Ever" on the 1997 ITV Chart Show end-of-year special.
 
Years later, I was bickering with a guy about his jukebox choices in a London pub and the subject of Vanilla came up. He told me that he’d actually been the sound engineer for the song, and claimed that the whole thing was a bet between two established music producers for who could produce the worst pop video.
 
I was right! My 13-year-old brain had cracked

Let's face it: If you were forced into a building filled with as many politicians as the Palace of Westminster contains you'd probably need a drink or two to get by, too.

That is not the sort of comment likely to endear itself to Alcohol Concern, which has conducted a survey of MPs revealing levels of alcohol abuse which it claims would warrant "immediate action" in any other workplace environment.

Parliament is not any other workplace environment. It is a building lubricated by booze and populated by an elite species whose business is eased by alcohol. From red-nosed MPs to their earnest young researchers living the dream, often fresh out of university, a pint or two here or there helps make the wheels go round.

Let's not get carried away here. The truth is the parliamentary drinking culture of yesteryear has died out - literally, in some sad cases. The big shift came when the Commons' sitting hours shifted to more 'normal' working times. Since then there has not been interminably

It was a winning British mixture of tradition, sarcasm and extraordinary silliness. Committee room ten was the scene for the private members' bill raffle this morning, in which backbenchers cross their fingers and hope they'll be selected to carry a bill forward to its near-inevitable demise in the Commons chamber.

It was seriously good fun. Deputy speaker Lindsay Hoyle, whose reputation in parliament is rising by the day, played up to the occasion well. Beside him, David Natzler, clerk of legislation, shuffling some crunched up bits of paper around an ornate black box. It really was that simple: it was like The National Lottery Presents: The Great Reform Act of 1832.

Perhaps we should use raffles for all political debates. It's as if politics was conducted by the Dice Man. Get a two and we'll integrate social care with the NHS. Get a four and we'll use baby's fingers as a new form of currency. It would liven Westminster up a bit.

Natzler shuffled the bits of paper around. "Number 20,"

Europe minister David Lidington was in a cheery mood as he picked up his Bloomberg pass on the morning of January 23rd this year. An ambassador greeted him here. A business leader greeted him there. They had all gathered to watch the prime minister entirely change the ground rules of Lidington's job.

I was also at Bloomberg watching Cameron's big speech. And, shortly before the assembled diplomats gathered in a private space to lambast the Europe minister, one of the European ambassadors told me he believed deep uncertainty would be created by the possibility of a British exit from the EU in 2017. Four months have passed since then, and Lidington is getting very used to dealing with uncertainty. As he explains, that was the point.

"The question-mark over Britain's future is there in the public debate already," he says. "What the prime minister did with his referendum pledge was to accept that reality and make clear he was going to lead the debate and shape the debate, to try and get

By Matthew Ashton

yesterday saw Chris Huhne being released from prison after two months. For most people, trying to re-establish themselves as productive members of society after a stint in prison is pretty tricky. Not only is there the social stigma that goes along with being detained at her Majesty's pleasure, there is also the huge stain it leaves on your CV. In the normal course of events politicians rarely go to jail; not necessarily because they have more virtuous characters than the rest of us, but because they can usually afford better lawyers and character witnesses (and being part of the political/legal establishment probably doesn't hurt either).

However the last few years has seen a small avalanche of MPs standing in the dock and being sent off to serve hard time. Six went down in 2011 alone. Subsequently many of them got to discover that prison is possibly not the life of luxury they might have previously thought. Of course for some of them it's quite a nostalgic

In a day or two, Tory MPs will vote against their own Queen's Speech in order to attach a symbolic statement reiterating what their leader has already promised them. It's all very baffling. What exactly are they trying to achieve and how much damage will it cause David Cameron?

What are Tory backbenchers doing?

Leading Conservative eurosceptics have tabled an amendment to the motion welcoming the Queen's Speech. At the end of line five, they want to add the statement: "But respectfully regret that an EU referendum bill was not included in the Gracious Speech".

The effort is led by one of parliament's most die-hard eurosceptics, John Baron, with able assistance by fellow right-wing troublemaker Peter Bone. Most of the other signatories are the usual suspects: bad tempered Tory backbenchers who are now quite used to rocking the boat. In fact, it's almost second nature. They include: Philip Hollobone, Philip Davies, Douglas Carswell, David Davis, Nick de Bois, Adam Afriyie, Zac Goldsmith,

By Amy Aeron-Thomas

Chris Huhne is currently serving time at Her Majesty’s pleasure for perverting the course of justice and not for the numerous penalties he received for bad driving. Professional footballers have grossly exceeded the speed limit with impunity, only to be given a fine/community service on the rare occasion they are caught. Gary McCourt was sentenced to a five-year ban and community service last week for killing his second cyclist – his driving had already killed in 1986.

These stories should be contrasted with those of the families who are suddenly and traumatically bereaved as a result of negligent and dangerous driving, which all-too-often is left unchecked by the state and results in life-long disabilities or death.

Today the government's consultation on its new 'victims code', the product of a promise to put victims of crime at the heart of justice policy, comes to an end. The proposed code does not include all victims of criminal drivers and in fact leaves out