Things are getting tetchy in the big gay marriage bun fight ahead of the vote later. Labour seem to have realised they risked ruining the whole Bill by playing politics and voting for Tim Loughton’s amendment, so Yvette Cooper has run to the airwaves to declare that Labour are putting down their own amendment to expand Civil Partnerships to heterosexual couples. Something they opposed in government but see a chance here to give Dave another bloody nose over.

Labour in 2004: "we do not propose to open civil partnerships to opposite-sex couples. CP is aimed at same-sex couples who cannot marry’"

— Guido Fawkes (@GuidoFawkes) May 20, 2013

Opportunism! Foul play, cry the Tories who point out that Labour are being cheeky: “The opposition have tabled a manuscript note to our amendment, it is not a separate amendment. Our amendment already has the provision to allow an immediate consultation, it says up to 5 years”. But when would this happen? Labour want one immediately while the Tories counter: “We hadn’t ruled out doing one immediately. We hadn’t specified when it would happen.” Confused? Guido is almost swivel-eyed with boredom…