It should have been Ming’s day. Yes, Ming. I never thought I’d see him leading a dog again, much less a revolt. Yet there he was, rising out of the scrum that is the Liberal Democrat back benches, to do something no one had yet done: say something sensible. He was calm, eloquent, impassioned. Lib Dems looked at him in awe, perhaps wondering why it was, exactly, they had dumped him.

The House was packed, as full as it is for PMQs, with all the main characters present in the drama that is The Arrest of Damian Green. Mr Green was there, chewing the tips of his fingers, knees jiggling. The Speaker reclined in his throne-chair, pudgy fingers playing with his golden watch fob. The Serjeant at Arms, whose spiky burgundy hair and pursed crimson lips belong in panto, had her trusty sword by her side.

It all went wrong from the outset. It was like a rocket launch in which the rocket never leaves the launchpad, only to open its door to reveal that it holds a crew of clowns. “It’s not fair!” cried Douglas Hogg, his entire body vibrating with outrage, as he led a Tory temper tantrum against the plan to limit debate on the motion to three hours only.

The debate about the debate lurched around the room like a slapstick sketch. Finally, Frank Field reminded MPs that – shock, horror - real people could be watching. “For us, clearly, it is high drama. For most of our constituents it has already descended into farce,” he said, insisting that the panto must stop.

As if on cue, up popped Sir Nicholas Winterton. “I was freely mixing with a whole range of people at the weekend,” he announced as MPs whooped, “and they view this as a matter of considerable national importance.” Sir Nicholas, red in face but never in embarrassment, now announced that even in Zimbabwe the police would never be allowed to come into an MP’s office in Parliament.

I am afraid that Harriet Harman, principal boy, only added to the air of unreality. She argued, stolidly, doggedly, that the Government, not the Speaker, should control the make-up of the committee that will investigate how Mr Green’s office had been searched without a warrant. The committee should meet and immediately suspend itself until all police investigations are over.

The Tories and the Lib Dems deplored this. In general, Labour MPs, constrained by a three-line whip, did not, although there were a few honourable exceptions. Andrew Mackinley, a man who grows more excitable by the day, was apoplectic. “If this had happened in Moscow or Minsk there be would one hell of a row,” he announced, swaying so fiercely that he may have been secretly tangoing. “Leaks to me are food and drink to me as a backbench MP and I don’t want to stop this coming to me. Send it in on rice paper and I’ll eat it before the police get it!”

What a relief when Ming arose and said, quietly but powerfully, that the government proposal was a nonsense. The remit was too narrow, the strictures absurd. “The timetable is risible,” he said. “Can you imagine what the response of the public will be if we say this important committee has met, it has appointed a chairman and it has adjourned indefinitely?”

Everyone thought he had won but, in the end, the Government – or should I say the whips? – triumphed by four votes. The Lib Dems and the Tories immediately said that they were boycotting the ludicrous committee. It ended in high-stepping chaos. Indeed, the only hero of this sorry tale is Ming the Magnificent.

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