Once a minister becomes tainted, the game is up

Raymond Snoddy says the kindest thing that could happen to Jeremy Hunt now is a reshuffle…

We now know for certain that culture secretary Jeremy Hunt is definitely going to survive – until at least the end of the Royal Jubilee weekend.

And because Lord Justice Leveson and his legal minions merely uncovered multi-layers of embarrassment rather than a smoking gun we can even safely predict that secretary Hunt will also probably survive until after the Olympics.

He may have sent a congratulatory email to James Murdoch on the Sky deal passing the Brussels test just hours before he took on responsibility for the issue from business secretary Vince Cable but the Prime Minister is still backing him.

Cameron announced yesterday – with surprising speed – that he will not order an investigation into whether the culture secretary’s behaviour breached the ministerial code.

There are two ways that senior ministers can lose their jobs. One is the formal route where there are allegations of serious misdemeanours. The second, the slow and more painful passage, which Hunt could yet experience, is the gradual evaporation of confidence in a politician, which ultimately undermines their ability to do their job.

Once a minister becomes tainted, even though he has done nothing illegal or improper, and becomes a laughing stock in the media and parliament – alas the game is up.

However many times he waves his Union Jack over the weekend the kindest thing now that could happen to Jeremy Hunt is a reshuffle and a new challenge to sort out any number of political messes such as health or education. Rupert is not very interested in either. And then perhaps we could all forget about local TV.

Earlier this week, meanwhile, it was truly shocking to find oneself in agreement with the vainglorious and controversial education secretary Michael Gove…