I'll have no truck with tax avoiders, says Boris. That'll make life awkward
• The war between Ken and Boris hots up, and already Boris has a stick with which to beat his rival for the London mayoralty: the controversy about Livingstone's decision to route his earnings through a company. A sensible way to proceed, says Ken, because the company in turn pays the salaries of others. No it isn't, says the Boris camp. He's playing fast and loose with tax. Boris doesn't approve of that. "I want a crackdown on tax dodgers and tax avoiders of all kinds," he told Andrew Marr at the weekend. But if the objection is a moral one he must be looking askance at his senior adviser and ex-campaign chief, Dan Ritterband. For what we know, thanks to sharp work by blogger Adam Bienkov, is that Ritterband was hired as part of the mayor's transition team in 2008, and then his fees were paid as "consultancy fees" to DJR PR Ltd, registered in a residential street in Nottingham with Ritterband as sole director. Not illegal, of course, but then neither was Ken's arrangement. City Hall says everything was above board. "DJR PR has not conducted any business since June 2008. All applicable taxes have been paid on fees paid to the company." But there is that thing about people who live in glass houses. And City Hall, all spherical and shiny on the Thames … that's a pretty big glass house.
• Interesting, meanwhile, to hear claims concerning attempts by Boris's policing honcho Kit Malthouse to wind down Scotland Yard's phone-hacking inquiry. Interesting also to note how the allegations, from the former commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson, were reported in the Sun. "'Hysteria' on phone hacking," was the headline, quoting Malthouse. And the accompanying text? "The multi-million pound probe into phone hacking has been driven by hysteria, the Leveson inquiry heard yesterday." They say at Wapping that they have grasped the public revulsion over hacking and the dark arts. Have they?
• And there's continuing reflection about the 2011 riots. Andrew Motion is still struck by the horror of it. There stood Waterstones in Clapham Junction, the only store untroubled by looters. "I felt it was a horrible manifestation of lack of educational opportunity," he tells the Camden New Journal. "They didn't care about books. Books were so unimportant. They were left untouched while everything else was taken." Terrible! What would you get for a black market sonnet anyway?
• Ahead of international women's day on Thursday, a cry of pain from fallen football pundit Andy Gray. You'll recall that, having disparaged a female line official and made lewd comments to a female co-worker, he was sent packing from Sky Sports. So unfair, he tells Mihir Bose in the London Evening Standard. "I do not see myself as sexist. Not in a million years. I have four daughters and I was brought up by a wonderful mother on her own. She's 91 and is distraught about what happened." The rector of the church where he was married for the fourth time was also female. "There you are," he says. Unarguable. M'lud, the defence rests.
• Finally, howls of outrage from Damian McBride, erstwhile spin doctor for clunking fist Gordon. Why were you out dining with your mates when colleagues at the Catholic aid agency Cafod were fasting to raise funds, was our question yesterday. McBride, ever the master of rapid rebuttal, responds. "My own Cafod fundraising fast is to give up booze for the 40-day duration of Lent, including St Patrick's day," he says. This is why, on the night in question, he alone drank non-alcoholic beverages. "I'm putting £20 per day aside that might otherwise have been spent on booze, so by Easter Sunday I'll have raised £800; and because Cafod is receiving Department for International Development match-funding this Lent, that will be £1,600 to go to our water projects in the Horn and east of Africa." What's more, "anyone who sees me take a drink during Lent can claim £1,000 from me for a charity of their choice." Yes, he "succumbed to a particularly delicious lasagne on Friday's fast day", but even we can't question his commitment. And when it's over he'll need a drink. He'll have earned it. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
twitter: @hugh_muir