A paedophile ring in Whitehall?

A READER inquires: "Nuclear scientists. Do they fallout?"

THANKS for your suggestions for the origin of the expression "I'll go to the foot of our stairs," which are so varied that I suspect the real story is lost in that well-known miasma, the mists of time. But I do like the suggestion that the foot of the stairs was the darkest place in the house and thus the closest place to hell. So going to the foot of your stairs was a way of saying "I'll be damned."

ALTHOUGH Wolf Hall (BBC1) has been widely praised, some critics say it's too dark. No it isn't. It is exactly dark enough. Back in ye olden days night was considerably darker than daytime and in the middle of the night it was very dark indeed. Confusion arises because we are so used to seeing Tudor stately homes illuminated at night. Henry VIII didn't do floodlights.

THE great thing about Wolf Hall on the telly is that you can understand what's going on, which is more than can be said for the original Hilary Mantel books. She has a curious writing style which people either love or hate. For every verdict of "magical," you will hear an irritated "impenetrable."

WHEN allegations of paedophile rings first broke in the 1990s, I could not believe them. Surely child abuse was such a shameful, secretive practice that no-one would dare breathe it to anyone else, let alone organise child-swapping orgies. But over the years, through the Savile horror and other scandals, we begin to see the blistering arrogance of people in the public eye who felt no guilt and believed they were above the law. And maybe they were. In the 1980s the Labour legend Barbara Castle handed a dossier of alleged paedophile supporters in Westminster to Don Hale, then editor of the Bury Messenger in Lancashire. Hale claims the moment he began to investigate the claims "an astonishing operation kicked in" to silence him. First he was visited by the Liberal MP for Rochdale, Cyril Smith, who insisted it was "all poppycock". Then Hale was visited by Special Branch officers. He says they showed him a D-notice forbidding publication, seized documents and threatened him with jail if he repeated the allegations. Hale went on to receive the OBE for campaigning journalism. Cyril Smith was exposed after his death in 2010 as a serial sex abuser. So whom do we believe today? Last week's death of Leon Brittan has refocused attention on allegations of paedophile activity in Westminster. Will we ever get to the truth? I doubt it. And I bet that 30 years from now we still won't really know why Britain invaded Iraq. When it comes to covering its tracks, the British Establishment is in a class of its own.

ONE of my many wrong predictions was that after a few weeks the media would get fed up with the term "The Duchess of Cambridge" and start referring to Prince Williams' wife as Princess Kate. It hasn't happened yet in Britain but the overseas media, especially those terrible Yanks, seem to be adopting it. Google now has more than three million references to "Princess Kate."

THE big theological debate in the United States is between folk who believe in evolution and those who subscribe to "intelligent design," usually involving God. On this side of the water, that essentially British programme Winterwatch (BBC) sat neatly on the fence. Presenter Martin Hughes-Games assured us the distinctive bill of the crossbill was "designed by evolution." Over to you, Mr Darwin.