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The latest principled stance by the Liberal Democrats appears to have tripped over its foot. Now that the Blairite bandwagon is sputtering sufficiently for them to be able to clamber onto it, the Lib Dems have demonstrated their improved salesmanship by cold-calling a quarter of a million voters in fifty marginal constituencies with a pre-recorded message from their thrusting young CEO, Nick "Who?" Clegg. Since the Lib Dems complained about a similar and possibly equally dull idea by the Scottish National Party three years ago, the SNP was understandably annoyed and complained to the information commissioner. The information commissioner ruled that the calls constituted a marketing campaign which, since little Nicky is not Agent Smith, would have required the prior approval of the victims.

Little Nicky said last week that he "rather hoped" that junk telephone calls in the evening without even the courtesy of a human being (or, arguably, a recording of a human being) on the other end of the line would not disturb. If people disliked the time at which the call was made, they could always refrain from picking up the phone, since of course the ringing of telephones does not disturb anyone until the receiver is taken off the hook. It says something for the quality of little Nicky's sense of principle and social responsibility that he can be accused of "utter hypocrisy" by Daveybloke's Cuddly Conservatives.