NO FEWER than six senior members of the Cabinet have been in possession of cannabis this week.

Well, sort of. The Welsh drugs campaigner Jeff Ditchfield had cannabis plants delivered to 10 Downing Street, the Treasury, the Ministry of Defence, the Attorney-General, the Home Office and the occasional Welsh Secretary, Peter Hain. In a covering letter, Ditchfield pleaded with ministers to “amend legislation to allow a specific defence for the cultivation and medicinal use of cannabis”.

Mystifyingly, Scotland Yard has no knowledge of any cannabis plants having been handed in by anyone. So where did all the doobie go? “Ours did go to the police,” a Welsh Office spokesman said, slightly defensively. “I’m sure of it.” Downing Street was a little more vague. “I, uh, don’t really know about that,” said a press officer in ponderous and (dare we say it) hazy tones, before promising to, like, look into it.

We didn’t bother with any of the others. Even if they had managed to answer their telephones, they’d probably have been unable to say anything sensible.

• Kazakhstan’s most famous journalist — a.k.a. the British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen — has arrived in Portugal ahead of tonight’s big event. In the guise of Borat, star of Kazakh television, Baron Cohen touched down in an Air Kazakh propeller plane with a one-eyed pilot clutching a vodka bottle at the controls. Borat is not the comedian’s first creation to host the MTV awards; Ali G did the honours in 2001.

  The ceremony will take place in Lisbon’s Atlantic Pavilion. Robbie Williams, Madonna and Coldplay are all set to perform.Coldplay and Gorillaz lead the nominations with five apiece, including best group and best UK act.

  The day Prezza put the flipper in

  IT WAS an angry Pauline Prescott who, in court on Tuesday, rounded on Greenpeace protesters accused of attacking the Prescott family home.

  She told them that her husband had been a great supporter of their cause and “had once swum up the Thames to protest against nuclear dumping”, this newspaper reported.

  John Prescott? Swimming in the Thames? Really?

  Really. A trawl through the archives reveals that way back when Prescott was a whippersnapper of 45 he did indeed swim two miles along the Thames to deliver a petition to Margaret Thatcher, the Prime Minister. Look. There he is. November 15, 1983. Sleek as ever.

  “The first 100 yards were the worst,” he said.

  Prescott jumped in at Chelsea Bridge and clambered out at Westminster Pier. At least they didn’t have to raise Tower Bridge.

  PS

  Many jealous stares on the Tory back benches yesterday as, alongside his poppy, Shailesh Vara (Cambridgeshire North West) sported a shiny new Blue Peter badge. “I was interviewed for Friday’s Blue Peter on the 400th anniversary of the Gunpowder Plot,” the proud Vara beams. “You might say there was green envy to match the green benches.”

• Variety reports that Kenneth Branagh is to direct a film version of Mozart’s The Magic Flute. Let’s hope that the Ducktastic director is better at holding on to his flutes than he is his ducks.

  people@thetimes.co.uk

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