I've just heard the most delicious rumour about Dennis Skinner. Now in his 39th year as Labour MP for Bolsover, the Beast turns 77 next month. His famous fiery hatred of Tories, “new” Labour, capitalist fat cats, globalisation, etc, remains undoused by the advancing years, though predictable ageist voices sneer that he should hang up his NUM marching boots at the next election.

Zoom in, now, to a constituency not far from working-class Bolsover in Derbyshire, though socially a million miles away: Grantham & Stamford (birthplace of Margaret Thatcher) has long been represented by Quentin Davies, MP, more than a dozen years Mr Skinner's junior. Study his CV: public school, Oxbridge, Foreign Office, the City, farm-owner, company director, Lloyds... Pink-faced and with an upper-class accent implausible even for a Tory, Mr Davies stood for everything Skinner detests.

Until, that is, Mr Davies defected to Labour in 2007. As (at Labour's conference) Mr Davies urged others to do likewise, hundreds stood to cheer - but not Mr Skinner, who sat on his hands scornfully. His thoughts when Mr Davies was made a minister are not recorded.

But as the next election approaches a cloud grows on Mr Davies's horizon. He'll never keep his old seat as a Labour candidate. Where could party bosses parachute him in? What ageing backbenchers in safe Labour seats could be poked into retirement to make a space? Reader, your mischievous mind has leapt ahead of me. But they wouldn't, would they? Not poor Dennis?

Well, that's the rumour. A malicious invention? Probably. But then again, Mr Skinner is believed to have said he'll never yield to one of those dreadful all-women Labour shortlists. He may not have to.

Raging over spilt milk

All over Britain, people at tea-stands, in cafeterias and in train buffets are fumbling with the new-style milk sachets that replace those tiny plastic tubs with a tinfoil top that we used to see. Now we are offered squishy, pencil-shaped plastic bags, each containing one shot of milk-substitute.

But you can't get the damn thing open. Or, rather, you tear where it says tear at the top - whereupon, like a leaking sow's teat, milk squirts out all over the table, or you or your fellow passengers. It isn't just me, honestly. Nobody can get it right: I watched three other customers, milk-spattered and cursing, on the train on Tuesday. Could we regress, please?

Lean and hungry

A word on behalf of the over-50 and thin. We thinnies have just endured another holiday season of plump friends leering over the mince pies, saying things like: “Ooh it's all very well for you. I only have to look at a currant and I balloon, whereas you can eat like a dog and never put on an ounce.”

The reason I eat like a dog is I missed breakfast and probably lunch. It wasn't for lack of appetite: I just don't want to get fat. We've noticed that, after about 50, weight starts corresponding with the amount we eat.

So listen up, fatties. We don't disparage, we don't judge. We love you as you are. But kindly desist from telling us we're thin because unlike you we can eat all we like without putting on weight. Wrong. We're thin because we don't eat all we like. We get as hungry as you. We're thin because of self-control. We're thin because we've decided to be.

Run, Snowy!

I'm in hiding this week from furious Tintin fans. Outrage in France, according to Charles Bremner of this newspaper, at my suggestion in times2 that Tintin was gay. Le Figaro is appalled. La Stampa in Italy is incandescent. In Switzerland and Belgium, too, the reaction has been horrified. Well doesn't that just prove my point! Now we know why poor Tintin tried to hide it. Which comic-strip character would dare come out, if that's the way the continentals take the news?

Are you listening?

Millions in Britain are creditworthy but looking in vain for credit. Millions of savers in Britain are looking in vain for somewhere to put their money that offers a reasonable return. And I've just had this brilliant idea for introducing the two groups to each other. It's called a “bank”. We don't have these any more. Why doesn't somebody start one?

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