More than one debutante appeared in the Commons at question time for the glamour department that Work and Pensions has become.

Tory TV star Esther McVey moved into a new spotlight. Confident, fluent, blonde. Did I say blonde? I meant attra- I meant professional.

Mike Penning, the person more responsible than anyone for IDS’ disastrous election as Tory leader is now his disability minister. That needs no comment, at least.

For Labour, Chris Bryant, something of a cult, has been reprogrammed and is promoting the opposite of devoutly-held pieties he previously professed. He is steadily on course to be one of the Commons’ Nearly Men.

And then Rachel Reeves, cruelly characterised by the BBC-left as “boring-snoring”, set out to put new life into her career.

She is often “tipped to be the next leader of the Labour party”. But the tipsters are Tory optimists looking for someone less inspirational, engaging, in-touch, life-enhancing than the toothsome incumbent. She is a rare candidate.

Hair and makeup – a success. The voice – yet to succeed. Personality – platform announcement.

“We apologise for the delayed arrival of the policy on platform 1. This was due to delays. The policy is in reverse formation. Tory coaches are at the back of the train. We apologise for any inconvenience to your voting intentions.”

IDS suggests that Labour’s new approach to welfare is a horlicks of false intentions and bad faith. Reeves and Bryant say they will out-tough the Tories but have voted against every measure to save a cent.

Frank Field asked how many permanent secretaries IDS would get through before his insane computer program finally crashes/burns/turns into a black hole and sucks the universe in. “It will be on time and within budget,” IDS claimed, heroically. And then demanded an apology for £26bn of failed Labour IT projects.

There is a lesson in there, truth to tell.

It is absolutely inconceivable that he or anyone else can deliver a real-time computer system to track Britain’s beneficiaries. Luckily it’s due in 2017, beyond the political event horizon.

Dangerous statistic: “600,000 unemployed eastern Europeans”. IDS refused to endorse the figure saying it included non-working-age migrants.