Brown won't mess with Purdey again!

Joanna Lumley should be in politics. She has stitched up the Prime Minister in a most sublime way. By getting a meeting with him before PMQs, she had him in a position where he had to answer questions. He got one on the Gurkhas from Iain Duncan Smith. Ms Lumley said she "trusts" Gordon Brown to do the "right thing" and said Mr Brown had taken the matter "into his own hands" and would come up with a "solution" to the issue of residency rights by the end of May. Even with Downing Street trying to imply that Joanna Lumley's version of the conversation was not quite like that, she got her man in the headlights of her tank!

Gordon Brown should have sensed she was not to be messed with. She had told MPs she had written three letters to him about the issue which went unacknowledged. This point is disputed by No 10. But they have not been able to save the PM from a thorough mauling by a woman who knows how to handle publicity and who no doubt picked up the traits of tenacity and forthright behaviour from her soldier father who served for 30 years with the 6th Gurkha Rifles.