Take your peck

Two Britons are facing a month in jail for giving each other a peck on the cheek in greeting at a Dubai restaurant.

Ayman Najafi and Charlotte Adams both deny the indecency charges. The couple were arrested after a 38-year-old local woman reported that she had seen them kissing on the mouth in Bob's Easy Diner in November.

They were found guilty of public indecency and sentenced to one month in jail and then deportation. They have been freed on bail pending an appeal.

Let's hope they didn't use tongues...

Biting the hand...

Lord Adonis, the Secretary of State for transport, has broken ranks and come out swinging against the seemingly suicidal decision of British Airways cabin staff to strike over Easter. Unite, the union calling for the strike has donated 11 million pounds to the Labour Party in the past three years and is already rounding on Lord Adonis with savage intent, and one imagines the warcry "Tora, Tora, Tora!".

Will the Government back their noble Lord?

The Pill, a life saver?

The pill is good for you, it's official, well this week anyway. No doubt next week it will be bad for you again, according to someone in a white coat from the University of Woooohah.

Researchers say it cuts your chance of developing cancer by 12 per cent if you use it for eight years or less, but if you use it for more than twelve your chances of copping the big C go up by 22 per cent.

Or, have one child and get a cat, any need for the pill will be completely academic quicksticks.

Death tax shrouded in mystery

Health Secretary Andy Burnham is facing some tough choices on how to come up with the cash to fund care for the elderly, the cost of which is rising steadily as our population stubbornly insists on living longer.

The preferred option looks likely to be a 10% 'death tax'. In real terms that means people with an estate valued at £500,000 would find their families hit with a bill for £102,500 when they pop their clogs.

Apparently you really can't take it with you...

And the cupboard was bare

There will be a budget on March the 24th, increasing the likelihood that the general election date will indeed be the 6th of May, the same day as local elections.

There isn't much left to give away, and the dead cat hasn't bounced nearly as high as the government would have liked, so we have a budget with all the entertainment value of a magicians hat with no rabbits. One trick is certain though, whatever happens at the election, Alistair Darling will disappear.

The have ones and the not have ones...

Her Majesty the Queen has used the annual Observance of Commonwealth Day service at Westminster Abbey to warn that internet use is an "unaffordable option" for people in many Commonwealth countries.

The Commonwealth, formed out of Britain's old imperial territories, accounts for 1.8 billion people, almost a third of the population on the planet. You can see the planet from the International Space Station, where, somewhat ironically you can also get a broadband connection.

OSCAR BRAVO INDIA TANGO

Whoever is spinning for Gordon Brown right now should be left alone with a bottle of port and a Webley to 'do the right thing'. It's a folorn hope though, because he or she hasn't done the right thing in a long, long time.

Advising the Prime Minister to visit to Afghanistan immediately after appearing at the Iraq Inquiry, especially as his version of events fiscal is being challenged by senior political and military figures, looks not only clumsy but cynical.

Iraq, for whom the till tolls...

Who's telling the truth, the current Prime Minister Gordon Brown, formerly the Chancellor when the Iraq war started, or the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Defence Secretary who was in situ at the time? Were the military given an unlimited purse, or were they hamstrung by financial constraints, leading to shortages of vital equipment?

Someone is telling porkys, and the coming election may well hinge on who that turns out to be.

Go tell the Greeks

After some fancy footwork on it's figures, Greece has finally come to the conclusion that it's time to 'fess up and hold out it's trotter to the other members of the Eurozone club.

It won't be disappointed, Germany and France would be way, way too embarrassed to allow a 'Eurozoner' economy to fail, even if it deserves to.

Could this prove to be their Achillies heel?

Gone, but not forgotten

Extolling the highest of principles, loyalty, compassion, duty to his fellow man, and a gritty determination to do the right thing in word, deed and action, unwavering in the face of party politics.

These were the things that marked Michael Foot out as a titan of our time.

One of the finest Prime Ministers the Labour party never had.

Lording it up...

The devil is in the detail as they say. Lord Ashcroft, the Conservative peer, made assurances to William Hague in 2000 that he'd take up 'long term residency' in the UK before taking seat in the House of Lords. Lord Mandelson, made a peer in controversial circumstances himself, has snitched Ashcroft out to the House of Lords Appointments Commission, suggesting that Ashcroft meant 'resident for tax'. Poor old 'Snitchys' finger pointing is going nowhere though as Ashcroft was vetted before the commission was established.