Owen Paterson’s defenders are treating voters with contempt

Nothing more surely demonstrates the Conservative party’s grip on power than its apparent determination that Tory MPs should be able to breach long-agreed, long-respected, House of Commons standards on what constitutes fit and proper behaviour for an MP. The parliamentary party’s decision to save Owen Paterson from the consequences of his own behaviour is itself remarkable. That such efforts are now be supported by the government is something close to breath-taking. They do it because they calculate they can get away with it.

And they are, miserably, probably correct to conclude as much. If you wished a demonstration of Tory supremacy and Labour impotence you could hardly ask for better than this. There may often be something to be said for a government armed with a mighty parliamentary majority; there is often, as this squalid episode demonstrates, much to be said against it too.

No matter how much smoke is created, the fundamental truth is a simple one.