They plan for the worst but hope for the best. Exciting times for troubled G4S
• It has been a difficult time for G4S, our favourite firm of people carriers, what with that difficulty over poor Jimmy Mubenga who died following "restraint" by G4S operatives in October 2010, an episode that may yet see the company facing corporate manslaughter charges. And more turbulence is expected soon when the company is sentenced in Western Australia, having admitted its part in the January 2008 death of Aboriginal elder Mr Ward, who died of heat stroke after being transported in searing temperatures inside a prison van. But like all good companies, it takes a balanced view and so it will be delighted with its latest contract win, a licence to advise and assess companies wanting to achieve the Investors in People standard. But not too delighted. For this is a firm able to greet the twin impostors: success and failure, and know that they are the same.
• With more need than ever for shining examples of good governance, it's distressing to see Lord Adonis, head honcho at the preachy Institute for Government, getting his knuckles rapped. He took the job without complying with rules obliging him to seek permission. The advisory committee on business appointments "noted with concern that the appointment had been accepted without advice being sought". Had an application been made, the committee would have said yes, so long as he does not personally lobby ministers, civil servants or special advisers for a while. It's a mild bollocking. A bollocking nevertheless.
• And as Ryan Giggs's father, who left the family home when our hero was but a youth, emerges to express, without irony, his disappointment that his son should be accused of betraying his family, life begins to mirror art in stormy Manchester. Hacks outside chez Giggs found their cars smashed up, presumably by self-appointed guardians of the injunctor. And they will find that the house next door to Giggsy's was the scene of the climactic scene in last year's Ken Loach film, Looking For Eric. There, a large pack of semi-hooligan United fans smash the house of a nasty piece of work in the film. The target in that case was a drug dealer, not the paparazzi. Still, cut both, they bleed.
• Yes this is the age of the injunction. Secrecy is everywhere. There have been 333 "gagging orders" granted protecting the identities of celebrities, children and other individuals, according to the Indy: 69 of them relate to high-profile individuals, 28 involve allegations of extramarital affairs. Everybody's getting them, it might appear. So we embark on a celebrity survey among those gathered in central London to support the launch of Off-Ice Skating, a new sport designed to replicate exactly the touch and feel of skating on ice, only without the need for ice. So Chloe Madeley, we ask, did you enjoy ice skating without the ice, and have you any superinjunctions outstanding? "Yes, and no," says Chloe, a little thrown. Linda Lusardi, do you see this as a good way to get people skating; and have you a superinjunction we should know about? No superinjunction, says Linda. "No need. Do you think I should have one?" Everyone else has, we tell her. It might be a good idea. David Seaman, ex-England and Arsenal goalkeeper, and star of Dancing on Ice, just laughs. No, I don't have a superinjunction. Wouldn't tell you if I had," he says. And then we meet David Van Day, who recalls that someone once tried to obtain an injunction against him, but it was rejected by the courts. As outcomes go, that was super, says David. We say that doesn't count. He promises to do better.
• For these are the days of sex, drugs and rock'n'roll; and those without vices can seem out of place. Colin Dexter recently received a letter from a reader complaining that his Inspector Morse novels were not racy enough. "The fact is I've never wanted to go into what goes on under newly laundered sheets," he told the Kettner Luncheon Club in London. Still he hates to disappoint, so he did write back apologising for his apparent lack of raciness. And he added a PS: "Please don't get the wrong idea – I do write pornography under a different name."