Robin Cook dies

I know this is yesterday's news and Robin Cook was a fairly mainstream New Labourite but when Robin Cook resigned from the cabinet over the war on Iraq he delivered a speech that was one of those "you could forgive him anything" moments. Click here for the full text of the resignation speech which showed that, whilst he may not have been a man of the highest integrity, he certainly had a lot more than the sorry bunch who rule us.

Iraq probably has no weapons of mass destruction in the commonly understood sense of the term - namely a credible device capable of being delivered against a strategic city target.

And on Israel:

I have heard it said that Iraq has had not months but 12 years in which to complete disarmament, and that our patience is exhausted.

Yet it is more than 30 years since resolution 242 called on Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories.

We do not express the same impatience with the persistent refusal of Israel to comply.

The Independent is reporting this morning that a "return to Cabinet role for Cook was on the cards" but with quotes like the above two there must be many in the cabinet who are glad that such a return is no longer on the cards.