It is hard to believe that Damian Green, the rather hapless MP for Ashford, has become a celebrity but, after yesterday, who can doubt it? He sat there, free at last, head bowed, arms crossed, legs jiggling up and down. It was supposed to be the Queen’s day, but it was Damian’s day instead. If he has done nothing else, Mr Green is most surely guilty of stealing the Queen’s limelight.

He looked utterly miserable, but then he and Eeyore have always had a lot in common. He sat directly behind David Cameron, in the middle of the “leader’s doughnut”. This meant that when the camera was on Dave, we also saw Damian. It was the most high-profile he has ever been. If he’s not careful, Mr Green may end up dancing the quickstep with John Sergeant.

The Queen should sue (or at least refuse to get out of her Cinderella coach next time) for her speech was virtually forgotten. Instead, this was Green’s Speech Day. First up was the Speaker, buckled shoes twinkling, lacy cuffs cascading around thick wrists, accent as thick as a goose-down pillow, as he gave us his version of the Arrest of Damian Green. Basically, don’t blame him. Blame the police. Or the clerks. Or the butler (if he can find one). Most unusually for the Speaker, this explanation worked and Tory MPs were baying for blood.

As if on cue, up popped Michael Howard, who is Mr Green’s Defender in Chief and who sees all of this as linked to the Civil War. His cry of outrage about the outrage sparked outrage and a stampede for gravitas. Ming Campbell jumped up to tell us there was a very serious issue. Another MP insisted it was a very grave and very serious issue. Forget a day of pomp, this was turning into a day of pomposity and circumstance.

The Speaker now called The Ashford One. Mr Green, his big soft shoulders sloping, his face reddening, kept it short but not so sweet. He was not above the law but neither were “those who have the real power in this country – ministers, senior civil servants and the police”. Gordon Brown, scribbling furiously on his madcap mountain of notes, did not look at Mr Green when he said: “The day when exposing facts which ministers would prefer to keep hidden becomes a crime will be a bad day for democracy.”

Other MPs, desperate to be part of the Green Day bandwagon, let rip. Denis MacShane, whose quest for publicity is legend and who can actually smell out TV cameras, said that, on the contrary, it was leaks that threatened democracy. He knew this because he was “a former minister”. As Mr MacShane said this wondrous phrase, he looked very close to bliss.

Iain Duncan Smith was wringing his hands with worry that Mr Brown (still scribbling and ignoring everyone) was going to rig the terms of the debate. This was navel-gazing at an Olympian level. I began to wonder if MPs, transfixed by Greengate, as some are calling it, had forgotten that, out in the real world, there was economic mayhem.

David Winnick, the Labour freedom fighter, cried for justice. “There was a breach of parliamentary convention! I would like to see a position where those responsible, those senior police officers involved, came to the bar of the House to explain their conduct! We need an explanation and we need it very promptly!”

The crescendoing frenzy hit fortissimo with the Tory MP Douglas Hogg. “It is a SCANDAL,” he cried (yes, in capital letters). As Mr Cameron took up the “Cry Freedom” cause with equal gusto, Mr Green looked even more miserable. He is becoming, against all odds, a martyr. If ever there were a case of I’m Becoming a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here!, this was it.

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