Are the Tories really keen to ease impartiality rules on TV news, which might see a Fox News-style partisanship on UK screens?

Apparently not. Paul Farrelly, Labour backbencher and former Observer business editor, asked this question of Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt in the Commons this week: “He [Hunt] will know that the British public value the political neutrality of TV news in this country, so will he confirm that the Government have no plans to change the rules governing political impartiality on TV news, and that they will expect broadcasters on digital terrestrial television to conform to those rules in the future?” To which Hunt shot back: “I can confirm that we have no plans to change the impartiality rules, but we will take no lessons on impartiality from the Opposition. There are two people responsible for impartiality in British broadcasting: the head of Ofcom and the head of the BBC Trust. One is a former Labour councillor and the other is a former Labour special adviser.”

Given that the Government has a big say in the appointment of the heads, what odds that Ofcom's Ed Richards and the BBC's Sir Michael Lyons are going to be in office for much longer?

Dinner for Conrad

Much talk about whether Conrad Black will be welcomed back into London society. Journalist Quentin Letts, a former columnist for the Daily Telegraph during Black's ownership, is no cheerleader for his old boss.

But in an article for Forbes magazine, Letts says he is prepared to give Lord Black a cautious welcome despite his past financial misdeeds. “On any scale of corporate misbehaviour, Black was but a minnow compared with some of the bankers and investment houses at the fore of the credit crisis,” claims Letts.

“An acquaintance of mine used to work as Black's secretary. Rosemary became terminally ill with cancer. Her employer — then at the height of his power — could not have behaved more decently to her. In Rosemary's hour of need, Conrad Black quietly rose to the occasion. The man is plainly not without fault, but, heck, if no one else buys him dinner in London, I will.”

* Not every stockbroker is a fat cat. The Financial Services Authority has just closed down the Liverpool Street and Basingstoke firm of Simply Trading. Its three directors — Stephen Coles, Luke Ryan and Michael Yamoah — were censured and banned from working in the City again. They would each have been fined £17,000 but for the fact that they all proved to the FSA “verifiable evidence of financial hardship”. £17K — that's what some brokers spend on dinner.

* Energy giant E.ON has hired fitness expert Nell McAndrew “in a bid to motivate families to get energy fit' by losing excess pounds from their energy bills”. It is calling this idea a “national watt-loss' competition”.

* Publicans facing being driven out of business by the smoking ban have been calling for a relaxation of the rules. They have taken the apparent opportunity presented by the Your Freedom website launched by Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg to make representations on the matter. Much good it has done them. “Of course there are suggestions which aren't going to be taken up... but at least the debate is now really alive,” says Clegg. So that's fine then.