Peter Rhodes on rugby, bribery and the scandal of Britain's huge national debt

Boris Johnson reacts to the academics' report by denouncing it as “demented Leftie effluvia” produced by “Regius Professors of Nambopambology”. The one-time Tory PM praises rugby as “one of the greatest sports ever invented” and a solution to the “problem” of teenage testosterone. I rest my case.

This ought to be a golden rule for chancellors: If you can't make a big tax cut, don't make one at all. Enormous bribes, like Margaret Thatcher selling off council houses at big discounts, will transform people's lives and probably change the way they vote. But a few quid off National Insurance or a piffling tinkering with tax thresholds will barely be noticed, let alone appreciated.

If Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has a few billion sloshing around he should use it to reduce the UK's national debt which is now so big, at a scandalous £2,500 billion, that the interest payments on it gobble up about £10 in every £100 the Government spends.

Lord Cameron declares that a two-state solution is the best way forward for Israel and Palestine. To outsiders, it certainly looks like the civilised, sensible option. But in the real world, how can you live anywhere when your neighbours want you dead? The tribes of the Holy Land have had thousands of years to rub along together, but always preferred smiting to making peace. When David met Goliath in combat, the result was not a two-state solution but a one-pebble solution. It's the Judean way.

According to a report produced by the SNP, one of the benefits of Scotland winning independence would be to compete in its own right at Eurovision. Can't you just see how that would go? Scottish viewers would vote for any song except the English one. Politics at Eurovision? Surely not.