UPDATE: Guido understands that the BBC political teams have been told not to go away over the weekend.

Guido thinks we may have found an example of a “scum sucking Tory pig”.  The troughing Wintertons are not standing at the election.  He thinks, like Lord Mandelson, that he deserves first class luxury on the back of the taxpayers, hasn’t he heard that for public servants it is the age of austerity from now on. Nicholas Winterton won’t be missed…

Listen to him defend his troughing on Radio 5:

Alastair has long revelled in his macho, hard-man, Malcolm Tucker image. He has gone through four Iraq inquiries and he gave no ground at the latest Chilcot Inquiry. He has also dealt with the “beyond doubt” question many times.  Why did Marr’s mild interrogation unsettle him?  Was it a cynical, calculated act or is Al cracking up again?

Bad Al is also said to have groomed Gordon Brown for his Piers Morgan interview, where he too tears up and gets emotional. Are they going for the sympathy vote?  Three months before the election Brown is blubbing for the cameras, having always claimed he was a private man and criticising Cameron (and by implication Blair) for doing the touchy-feely stuff.  Are they trying to fake up some kind of emotional connection with voters to compensate at the last minute for Gordon’s lack of EQ?

Guido is on Nicky Campbell’s breakfast show tomorrow talking about this topic.  What do co-conspirators think?

UPDATE : Bad Al has just blogged that his “exasperation button” was pressed.

Decent Labour supporters have been quick to condemn the BBC giving a platform to McBride. “It’s nauseating and woefully inappropriate” said Alex Smith editor of LabourList. “It’s not just the Tories who are feeling discomfort about the supposed return of McBride” added Jessica Asato director of Labour campaign group Progress. “It would be unwise for Gordon Brown to seek his counsel again…” says Left Foot Forward’s Will Straw. Perhaps most damning, PR Week’s left leaning David Singleton used Twitter to compare Damian McBride to a convicted criminal. Ouch!

Guido even had calls from people within the BBC who were none too impressed that their organisation had brought him back into the limelight.  None on the left managed to articulate the anger felt by many licence fee payers today as well as Nadine does “The BBC invite McBride, a self confessed fantasist and liar, standards that could hardly stagger from a gutter, to speak at a conference?” Quite.

Grasping at straws, but still loyal to Gordon, Damian McBride told the assembled Beeboids in White City earlier today that he thought Labour could hold on to enough seats to secure a hung parliament.  Paul Waugh and Ben Brogan have done follow-ups – Ben was actually there.

Damian slagged off Blair, claiming that during the mad cow crisis Gordon was sat with the Chief Veterinary Officer counting cows whilst Blair was only vaguely interested.  Some might think that Blair looking at the big picture rather than getting bogged down in micro-managing details was sensible for a Prime Minister.

Asked about the possible effect of “citizen journalism” on the general election, Damian said he thought the ubiquity of camera phones might cost a candidate dearly.  There was much smirking when Laura Kuenssberg cuttingly interjected that Damian himself “had an incident with new technology”.  Guido remembers her rottweiler-like pursuit of Damian during the opening weekend of Smeargate.

Do you think Damian is missing being in the game?

UPDATE : Danny Finkelstein is calling Paul Waugh on his somewhat, how shall we put it, well “spun” version of events – Waugh wasn’t there – Danny is implying that Waugh’s “BBC insider” source is not truthfully reporting events. Fancy that. A while back Paul Waugh was the only hack to report information that could only have come from Nadine Dorries, her lawyers, Guido or McPoison. When Guido teased him that he must have Damian’s new number, Waugh denied it.  Clearly Damian still has his number…

Damian McBride is back giving advice, and this time it is to the BBC.  According to Guido’s co-conspirator in White City he is speaking  (off-the-record terms) on the 5th floor at the White City HQ about now to an invited audience of BBC luvvies and executives on a discussion panel with Nick Robinson.

Guido has not been able to confirm from the BBC press office if, or how much he is being paid.

Surely the BBC hardly needs advice on doing Downing Street’s dirty work…

UPDATE : The BBC’s press office has just emailed:

It’s important for people to have the space to take stock, keep up with new developments and ensure we are providing the best possible service for our audience. The event allows staff across the whole of the division to come together to debate and discuss industry and editorial developments – including hearing from outside perspectives.

They also say Damian ain’t getting paid.

The only person to have a worse day than Gordon yesterday was the BBC’s Nick Robinson. First he humiliated himself on the Daily Politics making an ill-judged attacked on the madness of nameless bloggers and tweeters for reporting rumours of another push against Gordon.  It was the political equivalent of Michael Fish’s “no hurricanes” broadcast.

Within half an hour he had to eat his words, Guido texted him for an apology, he was less gracious off air (see picture) than he was on air  where he invited mockery.

This morning he was lambasted by Jack Straw for his shoddy reporting; “a very substandard piece of journalism”, “I was named by Mr Nick Robinson of the BBC – he sent me an apology” – which is more than Guido got.  Guido (and more neutral academic observers) thought he deserved an apology too.

So Guido took him up on his invitation and the Guy News video of Robinson’s on-screen reversal has gone viral around BBC TV Centre…

Guido was reporting rumours that a cabinet minister was going to call for Brown to go last night.  Bad day for Nick Robinson, at midday he dismissed the rumours as “the madness we might get into with blogging and tweeting” on the Daily Politics.

With all his authority he definitively told viewers that there was no plot and nothing going on. The Guardian’s Andrew Sparrow had the first squeak of the story at quarter past, Guido had the letter just after half past and yet it takes another half an hour for the BBC’s Political Editor to break the fact that MPs might be texting each other:

The BBC’s News & Current Affairs operation costs taxpayers billions…

Guido has learned that on the wall of the first floor of BBC Millbank there is a self-congratulatory note saying that they sold 100 cakes for Children in Need at £1 each.  However, the note points out testily that there is only £80 in the honesty box.  What Guido wants to know is who stole the cakes from Children in Need?

Millbank is the base for the BBC’s Westminster Lobby correspondents.  Trust is the key issue in political reporting…

Peston is at it again, the cocky hack claims he has “confirmed” matters thus:

“It has been confirmed that the Chancellor Alistair Darling will impose a one-off super-tax on city bonuses when he unveils his Pre-Budget Report today”.

Shouldn’t the Speaker demand of the Chancellor why Peston and not parliament was the first to know of his plans? The PBR is important and may contain market sensitive information.  Peston has previous on this, causing mayhem with share prices and arguably creating a false market.  Bercow made a big thing of insisting on the primacy of parliament when he was running for office. Prove it today.