Bank holiday mornings are usually dreary affairs, endured to the sounds of shrieking children and rain on the windowpanes.

This morning, as compensation, we have a few zingy articles in the press to cheer us up. Over at The Guardian, Jackie Ashley refers to David Cameron’s exceptional “chutzpah” — does she mean chutney?

When was the last time such positive thoughts for a Tory leader pinged from the bullet banks of the old Manchester teeth-grinder? I mean the paper, not Jackie Ashley.

So, let’s dig liberally into the chutney and hope that chutzpah is enough to win the next General Election.

I thought Dave looked a little chubby on Andrew Marr yesterday. Maybe he’s at the chutney too.

Boris Johnson was also heard moving in the undergrowth again at The Telegraph. Adding to the din of calls for a swift General Election he cites the dreadful state of legislation spewed out during the last 12 years. We need a House of Rebels, he writes, and, by implication, not shoppers and diners-out.

Why do many Tories sound so Cromwellian now? Aren’t they supposed to be Cavaliers, not Roundheads? Boris is a born Cavalier. A feather in his cap would utterly transform him.

But he’s right. We do need Parliamentarians for a complex technological age: MPs who will cut up badly drafted law and hurl it back at a slipshod Executive, forcing it to do better. Perhaps some Eton schoolmasters should be drafted in.

The floor of the House needs the capability to overcome government when it underperforms. That means a much higher quality of MP. Falling back on Esther Rantzen and Joanna Lumley would be total desperation. How good has Glenda Jackson been? Or Gyles Brandreth? Or that Leftie Shakespearean actor who went to Brussels?

Horses for courses. Ask any bookie.

But Derby winners, please.

Since we’re all in a rather bilious mood of rebellion against our leaders, here are two possible reforms to Government off the top of my head.

1. American Cabinets are not drawn from Congress as a rule. They are normally appointed from distinguished experts and public servants. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, for example, was at the New York Federal Reserve before the call came from Washington. Like us, there’s probably not the talent or expertise among career politicians on Capitol Hill.

Would they want to mop up 100 or so of the people who vote the money and pass laws for everyone? The “separation of powers” is bigger in the States than here, although I believe we invented the concept. Maybe that’s what’s gone wrong.

Gordon Brown tried a similar idea with his GOATS (government of all the talents). One by one the goatlings have fallen by the wayside, usually for lacking political savvy. Lord Myners slipped up over Fred the Shred’s pension. Others have left to take up motor racing, or got caught out for being human — a dreadful sin these days.

Digby Jones was probably the best, but he was stuck in some minor post as Prince Andrew’s bag-carrier. One suspects Brown’s heavy-handed incompetence destroyed the exercise.

Cabinet Ministers, especially Secretaries of State, must be selected from the best we have. They should also be vetted by Parliament before they are confirmed in office.

Prime Ministers must not have it all their own way. Often, as with Brown and Blair, they are the blockages that keep excellence out of government.

2. Why should leaders in the Commons choose the people who will revise their legislation in the Lords? Let’s remove the government’s power to stuff the second chamber with its placemen.

If you were up on a murder charge, you’d be astonished if you could choose anyone you wanted for the jury.

Improvements, such as these, need to be made now, when politicians are weak. The tragedy is, the old system ensures only they can make the necessary changes.

And turkeys don’t voluntarily jump into ovens at Christmas.

Gorbals Mick, otherwise known as the Speaker of the House of Commons, is almost history now.

But do you remember the Gorbals Die-hards? They were in a different class from the old black-robed sheet-metal worker.

You don’t recall them? Maybe Dickson McCunn will jog your memory. A retired Glasgow grocer, High Class, of course, Dickson — in his sixties — was the self-appointed leader of the Die-hards, who were a group of young boy tearaways, led by their Chieftan, Dougal. I wonder how that juxtaposition would play in today’s climate?

No, then how about Huntingtower? Or The House of the Four Winds?

Last chance: John Buchan.

Yes, I hear you shout — a bit late, if you ask me.

I left out the third book in the series, Castle Gay, because it’s taken on a wholly different meaning since Buchan’s day. More Graham Norton than Richard Hannay.

I mention the Die-hards because not everything narrow, puce-faced and boring came out of the Gorbals. The novels are wonderful confections of adventure, fights to the death, swashbuckling characters, and the kind of wild possibilities that appeal to teenage boys (and many older ones) almost everywhere.

It would be an interesting experiment to try out Huntingtower, written in 1922, on a modern comp-educated class of teens. Once they got over the very different morality and beliefs of the post-WW1 world, I’m sure the exhilaration of the story, far-fetched as it is, would grip them. After all how far does Harry Potter demand the suspension of disbelief?

You can download the Gutenburg version of the novel here.

I picked up my copies from a secondhand bookshop while still at school. They were very tattered but part of that great orange Penguin series that can still be found on sale all over the country.

I mention all this because every time I see Gorbals Mick presiding over the House, I think what a disapointment he would be to Wee Jaikie and the other Die-hards.

One of the great journalistic duels is taking place in the Business section of the Sunday Telegraph.

In the blue corner: Ambrose “Mr Deflation” Evans-Pritchard. In the red corner: Liam “Mr Inflation” Halligan.

Both are brilliant journalists and masters of their field. They differ in their assessment of the current economic circumstances, especially for the United Kingdom.

Ambrose admits to being “tortured by self-doubt” over his analysis. Liam is ruggedly certain of his.

Ambrose believes “two-thirds of the world will be in deflation by July”. Liam points to the climbing oil price which will wipe out all the stimulus effects of quantitative easing.

I suspect that both are right. Some parts of the world will fall into deflation — many countries already have. But inflation is the underlying wealth-destroying genie that has, once again, popped out of the bottle, thanks to Central Banks and politicians covering their backs against a 1930s-style Armageddon.

It may be a few years down the road, though, and deflation has to be fought now, as the Bank of England implies by its continuing policy of buying gilts. But it will let rip eventually.

As always, it’s a case of Up-To-A-Pointism. We are nowhere near out of the woods yet.

Once again the European Union is interfering in the running of the British state.

Not content with forcing us to adopt the useless mercury-filled light bulbs prescribed by them, we are now expected to switch from Watts — named after a fine Scottish gentleman — to “lumens”, a continental concoction that means nothing to the British.

Soon a size 9 shoe will become a 43, calories will be “joules”, after a long-forgotten Frenchman, and the English Channel will be called the German Waterway.

Why do these things happen? Because our politicians are not worth the spit they lick on their freebie postage stamps.

John Evans

Recent Related Stories
DIARY: Brown as actor, Queen and manuregate, Bryan Appleyard, Autumn crunch for Europe, Speaker out, Man U wins plaudit
DIARY: Political outsourcing, Public works, Citizen journalists, Patriarchs, Scottish politicians, County elections
DIARY: Balls’s edyukishun, Turkish delight, Pigs flying, Bacon sandwiches, Hattie and Boris, Referendum
DIARY: David Cameron, Publishers and authors, MP’s expenses, Football and Gordon, Globalization of the left, 50p tax rate, Giscard d’Estaing