Darling's careless talk won't cost him his job

ALISTAIR DARLING is one of the most pleasant men you could hope to meet in politics. Seasoned practitioners of the black arts of back-stabbing and sweet-talking watched his apparently effortless rise through the ranks of the Labour Party with uncomprehending wonderment. How come a nice guy who wouldn't recognise a dirty trick if it bit him ends up as Chancellor of the Exchequer?

Cynics will chorus that he's there courtesy of Gordon Brown. But even if there's a bit of truth in that, it doesn't reflect badly on him to have the PM trust his steady, truthful reliability to keep the Treasury aloof from the various scandals that ruined Labour's reputation in the dying days of the Blair regime.

Along with the Pirates of Penzance black beard that made him stand out from the pressed suits gang of New Labour clones, all that's history now.

After the interview in which he stated the obvious – that the present economic difficulties are the worst we've faced for 60 years and that the governed are "p****d off" with their governors – he's a dangerous maverick, not to be trusted with spinning the agreed line, "the UK economy's weathering the global recession just fine".

Usually, when a government minister strays so far from the rest, he or she knows exactly their reasons for doing so. They either want to bounce colleagues into supporting their point of view, or they want to get their retaliation in first, and distance themselves as far as possible from what they judge to be a wrong-headed decision by their government.

Maybe Alistair Darling was trying to do something different. Maybe, in his own way, he was trying to support Gordon Brown.

Nowhere in his interview did he disown the government's actions in dealing with the effects of the credit crunch and rising prices of food, fuel etc. Neither did he hint at having a different political or philosophical vision for the future conduct of economic policy.

Yet he still did commit the sort of political no-no that in the old days caused Honourable Members to resign when dire consequences followed their words or actions.

As the interpretation put on the Chancellor's comments caused a fall in share prices and in the value of the pound against other currencies, some of his illustrious predecessors would have felt obliged to do so, but this isn't such an age. The fashion is for governments to be found culpable of stupidity, cupidity and worse, but for nobody to be found responsible.

So, if the nicest man in the Cabinet isn't going to jump, should Gordon Brown give him a push? Probably not. If the PM decides his Chancellor and old pal has made a mess of conveying the Government's underlying confidence that it can hold things together, were he to sack or reshuffle the Chancellor, he would be inviting commentators to speculate that the real reason for his leaving the Treasury was the division between Darling and Brown over the housing crisis and the credit crunch.

Basically, Brown seems willing to pay the price for bailing out the mortgage lending banks because he doesn't want people to be dispossessed of their homes. This gives relief from homelessness, but also writes an open cheque for the banks' shareholders.

Darling, the Treasury and a fair number of leading economists are opposed. Even though they probably have the stronger economic argument, the PM has the stronger political case.

Arguably, what cooked Alistair Darling's goose was his adamant assertion that, no matter how brilliant a technician, if a politician fails to communicate his message to voters, he's not up to the job. Quite.

Putin is a stunner
Alistair Darling may not be a master of PR kidology and spin, but he's in Alastair Campbell's class compared to Vladimir Putin.

In an initiative bearing the hallmark of a PR operation, he took to the woods in camouflage army fatigues to observe a threatened species of Siberian tiger. He was accompanied by a film crew, there to record how sensitive he is in protecting animals with no defences against man-made changes to their natural environment, but how decisive he is when tough action has to be taken in defence of his people.

As the woman from the film crew remarked after the tiger had been stopped in its tracks by a single shot from the gun carried by Putin, it was a miracle that the tiger hadn't reached her crew.

The real miracles were that it was all captured on camera, and that nobody laughed when Putin stood over the comatose tiger with his stun-gun – which presumably goes everywhere with him, for use in emergencies.