Sir Alan Sugar Joins Government

While Sir Alan Sugar isn't quite ensconsed in the Cabinet yet, he is moving ever closer into the heady world of Labour party politics. Is his new gig as 'enterprise champion' (for which he'll also receive a peerage) a dress rehearsal for a tilt at the Mayor's job in 2012, as has been rumoured in recent months? Whichever way it pans out, there's an interesting parallel to Gordon Brown's appointment of "Suralan", star of reality TV show The Apprentice, to his govenment: in April 2007, Brown claimed in a Guardian interview that Britain had "fallen out of love with celebrity" and that, as PM, he would slake a "thirst for seriousness". Oops. Still, it's pretty brave of Gordon to put on the payroll somebody with a catchphrase identical to the one he's been hearing en masse from his own backbenchers for weeks.