David Cameron's attempts to wind Gordon Brown up appeared to be succeeding. But a burst of unexpected comedy from the prime minister helped restore his benevolent mood.

By Alex Stevenson

After the pomp and ceremony of the Queen's Speech this morning, it was time for a return to normality this afternoon. Namely, Cameron bashing Brown to bits.

His initial efforts failed; Brown merely simpered inanely when he was told "the NHS is not this government's first priority". He flashed a Blairite grin at the opposition benches when Cameron called him "incompetent".

And when the Tory chief demanded he stand up and explain himself on one point or another, Brown very deliberately engrossed himself in conversation with his next-door neighbours.

"We've just seen from the prime minister - they've run out of courage as well," Cameron said theatrically. Brown, legs crossed, rocked himself to and fro, smiling placidly.

He even had to stop himself bursting out laughing when Cameron attacked his

The Queen will be wondering why she bothered.

By Alex Stevenson

After three hours of buildup, just six minutes passed between the lord high chancellor Jack Straw's bowing and scraping to give her the Speech and his bowing and scraping to stuff it back in his sack. Not all of the Speech was even about the government's legislative agenda, anyway.

"The Duke of Edinburgh and I look forward to our visit to Bermuda and our state visit to Trinidad and Tobago," the Queen said lightly, completely lacking the air of one telling others about a coming holiday. It seemed much more relevant than what Gordon Brown was hoping to shove through parliament, anyway.

Then, towards the end, Her Majesty demanded the attention of "members of the House of Commons". Was a stinging rebuke about their expenses forthcoming? No, just a handy piece of information that "estimates of the public services will be laid before you". Brown nodded approvingly, apropos of nothing, before looking round to see if any peers had

Eric Pickles will find it hard to shake off unrest among the Conservatives' grassroots. Now the battlelines are clear, the Truss deselection row could be repeated again and again before polling day.

By Alex Stevenson

As Conservative party chairman, it's Pickles' job to keep a firm grip on the internal operations of the Tories.

But doing so remains fraught with difficulty, even after Tory PPC Elizabeth Truss survived an attempt to deselect her last night.

"The Conservative party always tries to work by the basis of consensus," Pickles told the Today programme this morning. Yet the scenes outside the South West Norfolk Conservative Association yesterday evening were far from harmonious.

Sir Jeremy Bagge said Central Office had "deceived" and "betrayed" local party members. One of these, John Strafford, called Pickles a "dictator". Truss, in placatory mood, suggested the "flim flam" focused on by the press wouldn't interest her constituents. Consensus seems a million miles away.

At the

Gordon Brown's suggestion of a tax on financial transactions will be dismissed. We should pay more attention.

By Hannah Redmond

The G-20 finance meeting has revealed Gordon Brown to be a modern day Robin Hood. Well, sort of. He tentatively suggested the idea of a Tobin style taxing of financial transactions, using the cash raised to, among other things, support developing countries to adapt to a changing climate. As you would expect from the world's twenty biggest economies, this idea didn't exactly go down well.

The US, Canada and Russia made it immediately clear that they would not support taxation of bank transactions, with US treasury secretary Timothy Geithner leading the negative response. And although there has been some discussion in favour of Tobin tax throughout Europe in the past, no outright support for this latest suggestion was voiced by any representatives at the meeting.

Brown was very clear in acknowledging that, to be successful, the proposition would require full

Britain is stuck in a hell of its own making. If we don't reconsider the special relationship now, we never will.

By Ian Dunt

I don't know what to do in Afghanistan.

I'm paid, among other things, for having an opinion on things, but I'll be open about this. I don't know what I would do.

I opposed the war when it began. There were very few people there, in Trafalgar Square, in those first days, as the world still recovered from September 11th. Later, when Iraq began, we saw what it was like to have support. Afghanistan wasn't like that. The right supported it because they enjoy that sort of thing, and value our relationship as America's puppy. The left supported it because it hadn't thought through its ideas on 'progressive interventionism' and women's rights. We shouted into silence and indifference.

Fast forward an unthinkable amount of time and we are still there. We are imbedded in a country we cannot pacify. It is vast and ancient, and its people are impossible to comprehend. Only

Usually by 15:00 on a parliamentary Wednesday the party leaders are relaxing after their weekly Commons ordeal. Perhaps this was why this week's prime minister's questions was a choppy, queasy affair.

By Alex Stevenson

The sense of unease was palpable after the morning's service in Westminster Abbey, which forced this week's PMQs into its unusual afternoon slot. MPs quivered in nervous silence as the party leaders repeated their usual condolences about the latest war dead. The care with which Gordon Brown strove to correctly pronounce the names of those fallen - a mistake would have been utterly disastrous for the prime minister after his spelling errors - underlined the tension.

Cameron whistled through his easily enough, before slowly easing up the pressure on the prime minister. After some opening skirmishes based on yesterday's miserable unemployment figures he went on the offensive, by announcing in grandiose terms a leaked memo from the business department. Brown's ears pricked

Britain's prevailing emotion on this historic Armistice Day is not one of pride, or sadness, or anger. The country is filled with a growing sense of deep, troubling unease.

By Alex Stevenson

That was the mood in Westminster as, for the 90th consecutive year, Big Ben's 11th-hour chime heralded the start of a two-minute silence of remembrance.

Standing outside Westminster Abbey it was clear the bustling capital did not, quite, come to a stop. Crowds gathered on the shut-off Whitehall to observe the silence. Inside the Abbey itself, the Queen, Gordon Brown and others reflected carefully.

But on Parliament Square only some of the traffic stopped. A group of excited teenagers, evidently on a school trip to London, yelled excitedly for a good 30 seconds before finally realising they might want to consider shutting up. An old man gazed at them, shaking his head slowly. London did not so much stop as falter.

I spoke to some of those who had observed the silence. Their range of views was

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Alan Johnson has only one improvement on his predecessors:
his inaction.

By Ian Dunt

It's becoming increasingly clear that the only difference
between Alan Johnson and his predecessors is his apathy.

A popular figure, he was brought into the Home Office in
Gordon Brown's last-gasp reshuffle. A potential leadership candidate, he was
given the job no-one wants - the graveyard of political careers. A party
loyalist, he took it.

Once Johnson came in to the Home Office, the mood in the
previously hyper-active department changed instantly. He had a simple mantra:
No defeats, no victories. He would keep the tiller still. No big
accomplishments, but no foreign prisoner–style PR disasters either. Johnson was
determined to survive the Home Office.

In that he has so far been successful. His changes, such as
they