Belatedly, here’s my tuppence on Alastair Campbell’s diaries: he was a spin-doctor, an unprecedentedly successful one. Did anyone seriously expect him to be anything other than utterly calculating and ruthless? What stings people most, especially the press, about Campbell is how he managed to manipulate us so skilfully for so long.

And yet it seems to be happening again, right under our noses. One of the most skilful media operators of recent times has turned Britain into the Gullible Man of Europe. He opens his mouth, we take what he says as gospel. Because of his enormous wealth – enormous wealth having become one of Britain’s favourite preoccupations – and his shadowy past, he makes us politically correct, environmentally conscious pauper squares feel a little bit close to the edge, a little bit glamorous. Much like that gangster chic phase we went through during which the Kray brothers suddenly became fashionable, we feel we’re playing with big boys now. Only this big boy is playing us. It is intolerably embarrassing.

I’m talking about Britain’s new best friend, Boris Berezovsky, who arrived on these shores in 2000 and has been wanted for extradition by his former friends at the Kremlin ever since. The four-times-married “original Russian billionaire” famously boasted in the 1990s about how he was part of a small coterie of so-called oligarchs who owned 50 per cent of Russia’s wealth. Despite this, the British people now happily accept that a man who became seriously rich in the turbulent, shadowy periods of recent Russian history has now been born again as a democracy-loving human rights campaigner, as he insists. When, further, it emerges that an attempt on his life has apparently been made we unquestioningly accept this as fact, as if real life in 2007 does in fact exactly mirror the plot of an Ian Fleming novel.

Let’s go through that “assassination attempt” again. What happened was this. The first version posited that a Russian man known to M15, armed with a gun and using a child as a decoy, was about to take aim at Berezovsky in the Park Lane Hilton when British Secret Service agents dramatically saved the day by apprehending the gunman. Subsequent reports present a less exciting scenario. The would-be assassin was actually staying at the Hilton and there was no gun. Oh, and Berezovsky was out of the country. Finally, who do you fancy was the primary source for the stories? It was our £800 million hero, of course. According to Berezovsky, he’s spent his whole time in Britain dodging bullets, which may be true but raises more questions. First, what was he doing last month giving a talk at Miller’s Academy, a lecture hall in West London with the security standards of a village town hall? Secondly, if it really is the life ambition of every former communist trained assassin to kill this man, why isn’t he locked up in a safe house, as Salman Rushdie was? Why, instead, was he granted a British passport? And in what way will this passport save his life? We rang the Home Office, but it wouldn’t tell us.

In Russia Berezovsky is wanted on a long list of charges, including embezzlement and financing Chechen guerrillas. Some of these allegations are undoubtedly part of a larger smear campaign, but are they all? And before you switch off to rant some more about that evil Campbell, here are some more questions, which concern you. Why do we in Britain think that Berezovsky is in any position to foment this revolution of his?

Ask anyone in his homeland about how popular he is there and they’ll tell you that he is almost universally loathed. Even Gary Kasparov – whom Britain erroneously believes also constitutes a threat to Putin’s power (when the champion chess player holds his protest rallies around Russia a couple of hundred people turn up) – has publicly derided Berezovsky and angrily denies that he helped to fund Kasparov’s opposition party.

What we must bear in mind about this undoubtedly intelligent, charismatic and occasionally charming man is that he knows the game, having had his finger in several influential media pies. In the period leading up to Putin’s election, Berezovsky controlled, among other publicity vehicles, Kommersant, then Russia’s main business newspaper, as well as ORT, its main television channel. He was one of the architects of Putin’s rise to power and has spent the intervening years grinding an axe about his fall from grace.

It’s not clear what exactly his aim in life now is, other than to destabilise Russia or dream idly of using “force to change this regime”. To that end, he seems to realise how susceptible we British are to a bit of prejudiced speculation. Say bad things about the Kremlin and, parrot-like, British journalists and intelligence agents will start talking about the “new cold war”.

Berezovsky obtained British citizenship after he changed his name to Platon Elenin. Why he changed it has never been explained. The Brazilian authorities have issued a warrant for his arrest on charges of money-laundering.

Does it matter? Think back to 2000, when Mohamed Al Fayed lost his attempt for British citizenship. Judges at the Court of Appeal ruled against it on the ground that he was not of “good character”. But Al Fayed provides thousands of British jobs and has poured millions of pounds into various charities. He also pays British taxes.

By contrast, Berezovsky pays no tax in the UK on foreign earnings, while the legal cost of fighting Russia’s extradition request is running into millions. In this canny multi-millionaire, has the Home Office finally found a human form of that previously mythical creature, the shadowy tycoon with a heart of gold?

Transformed into an unaffordable place

Something urgent must be done about the National Consumer Council, which has just sent me an e-mail to say: “As the new Transformers film hits Britain’s screens, the NCC is calling for a change in advertising codes to close a loophole in the way companies run marketing promotions to children.” Who honestly cares? Hasn’t the NCC noticed that there are more pressing matters at hand, such as Ruth Kelly’s announcement last week that in future the people of Britain will have to sell their homes to afford the train fare from Newcastle to Penrith?

Unless you, too, are a grotesquely wealthy nondomiciled tax refugee, you’ll have noticed that Britain, especially the capital, has become an eye-wateringly expensive place to live. It’s no fun any more. But, perversely, we revel in our status as one of the world’s most extortionate countries, as well as one of the fattest, unhappiest and drunkest. Taking the train, taking a cab, parking a car; renting a property; eating out, eating in – even buying a lime soda the last time I checked – all these have become bankrupting luxuries. Possibly we need the alcohol and the antidepressants to cope with the realisation that we’re all going to die destitute. Possibly we need to sack the staff of the NCC and replace them with something more muscular – a bunch of time-rich, disgruntled Russian spooks perhaps.

Smokers’ revenge

The Government’s domestic energy watchdog, the Energy Saving Trust, is urging consumers to “just wear a jumper”. Ownership of domestic patio heaters has reached 1.2 million as the people of Britain set about creating an artificial summer to replace the extended March in Falkirk we are having. Patios in pubs have “exacerbated the problem”, as no self-respecting smoker will stand for being forced to light up in less than tropical heat.

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