Committee work

As Lord Patten and Tim Davie head for a meaningless grilling by MPs of the Culture Media and Sport Select Committee, parliamentarians would do well to remember they, or their predecessors, were taken in, too - see below.

Patten's hiring of Tony Hall, and the pending Smith and Pollard inquiries ought to make this session brief, as long as the BBC side plays a straight bat - and doesn't rise to baiting by Davies, Rotherham and Sanders. Kremlin watchers will be interested in the minders lined up behind Patten and Davie.