Politics: The Sketch: Howard's flabby black belt fails to put Cook on the floor

BY THE END of the day the one topic of conversation around the House (though not in it) was Ron Davies's ill-advised attempt to set up a private focus group on urban crime.

Inside the chamber the only sign of this galvanising milestone in the Government's early development (the first scandalous Cabinet resignation being definitely one for the Baby Book) was an unusually lugubrious look on the face of the Welsh Whip. But perhaps he was just depressed by a dull day in the house, with a brief set-to between the Foreign Secretary and his Shadow topping a lacklustre bill.

As bouts go, Michael Howard versus Robin Cook is never going to shift many satellite sets. The outcome is just too predictable. The former Home Secretary ("He's back and this time he's Querulous!") is somewhat flabby these days, given to wild roundhouse swings which mostly miss their target. And though Mr Cook is only a bantamweight, he is gifted with a particular solidity of stance at the dispatch box, a rootedness which doesn't rule out swift footwork.

It's a good deal easier to dominate such encounters, of course, if the person you're up against persistently throws himself off balance with the extravagance of his blows. But as Mr Howard spins round, following the impetus of a fist unimpeded by any contact with his opponent's head, Mr Cook doesn't often miss the opportunity to jab in a couple of quick smacks at his ear.

Mr Howard certainly didn't see the first one coming - in which the Foreign Secretary expressed his bemusement that a warrant issued by Bow Street magistrates and carried out by the Metropolitan Police should be interpreted by the Opposition as a "left-wing conspiracy". Mr Howard certainly could have predicted the next poke coming his way because it took the form of one of the Chamber's more tedious rhetorical cliches - an expression of ersatz distress at the level to which the speaker's opponent has fallen.

Did the Home Secretary, Jack Straw, not have the discretion to refuse an extradition order, asked Mr Howard. And if so why hadn't he used it? The first response was the feint: "There was a time when the Conservative party would have prided itself on being the party of the rule of law," replied Mr Cook. He shook his head, pained at the degradation of that once great institution. Mr Howard was emboldened to have another go, at which point Mr Cook let him have it: "If he's really saying there were occasions when he secretly squashed a warrant for extradition I think he should tell the house about it". Mr Howard decided to sit out the count.

If Mr Straw was woken from his slumbers shortly before General Pinochet to be briefed on developments, I imagine he probably stuck both fingers in his ear and hummed a couple of loud bars of "Things Can Only Get Better". Because the moment this matter was irretrievably in the hands of the police it could usefully be declared to be out of his. "The rule of law" is not just the "foundation stone of democracy", as Mr Cook high-mindedly informed the House, it is also a very useful rock to hide behind when the air is thick with difficult questions. The Speaker explained as much during a noisy Points of Order.

Why, Ann Clwyd asked, had an Early Day motion applauding the General's arrest been "disappeared" from the Order Papers? Because, Madame Speaker explained, the General's corpus was at present in possession of an English court, and only when the judges had finished sitting on it could members have their turn. She reminded members that they themselves had voted to limit their privilege when it came to sub judice matters. Their indignation, it seems, is under house arrest for the time being but a release date is very close.