Another Little Sweetheart

It appears that a private secretary to Osborne's flunkey David Gauke may have committed an indiscretion which could enhance his expendability somewhat. When a whistleblower exposed Dave Hartnett's taxpayer-funded gift to Goldman Sachs, HM Revenue and Customs did what any responsible public service would do: they went to the Press. An HMRC executive emailed Gauke's private secretary with the idea of briefing a tame Financial Times hack, and the metaflunkey duly wrote back proclaiming a positive response from on high. In doing so, of course, he has set himself up for a fate similar to that of Adam Smith, the special adviser used, in lieu of an actual human shield, by Jeremy C Hunt to protect himself against allegations of being a flunkey of Rupert Murdoch. Those allegations, it will be remembered, were duly shown to be entirely false, as demonstrated by Hunt's continuing employment in a cabinet run by Loldave and the Leveson-bashers. It is not as yet clear whether Treasury officials have petitioned the Department of Health for a loan of the sword that Smith fell on.