Deborah Orr: It's easy to praise the public on decisions that don't matter

People power, as it pertains to television anyway, is proving to be a tricky beast. This week, or so we are told, the entire nation has gone into convulsions, because John Sergeant, the veteran political broadcaster, bowed out of Strictly Come Dancing, fearing that he might win.

Sergeant was the public's favourite, not because he was a good dancer – he wasn't – but because he came across as charming and entertaining.

Who wins, and who loses, in the great John Sergeant debate? Hazel Blears, pictured, may have thought she could win, by appearing on Newsnight to comment on the week's least alarming national scandal. But as she delivered killer lines like "the public are brighter than we give them credit for" and "it just shows that when you make it easy for them, people will vote", I found myself thinking how jolly it would be if only we all got the opportunity to vote talking heads off current affairs shows.

Critics have leapt to point out, like Blears, that in their simple and honest way, the public is right to vote for the person who entertains it most, rather than the best performer. If Strictly Come Dancing really was a dance competition, as the judges so haughtily proclaim it to be, then it wouldn't feature people who have already achieved some success in their careers. It would be more like The X Factor, offering hopefuls a chance of making it.

Yet, The X Factor has its own troubles with unbiddable voters as well. Last Saturday, the show's éminence grise, Simon Cowell, could be heard bemoaning the sad fact that the wise judges had lost control of the show. This was because a talented young woman, Laura White, had been voted off the week before, while one or two stunningly average pub belters (selected by those oh so discerning judges in the first place) had gone through to the next round.

How happy the judges were by the end of the programme, though, when good sense had been restored and the sing-off between the least voted-for contestants featured the two people who had turned in the poorest performances. It was almost like a Shakespearean comedy, when in the final act all misunderstandings are smoothed over, all chaos is banished, and everyone lives happily ever after.

Except that, as ever, there were one or two desperate intimations that things were not so very smooth after all. Ruth Lorenzo, the only non-Brit in the competition, declared after covering "Angels", written by Robbie Williams, that she'd like to thank Britain for gifting the world with such a wonderful song. The woman is well aware that she doesn't have a "regional fan base" who will vote for her, and so is at a disadvantage. Her comments were a clumsy attempt to present herself as a patriot. If it is bright to be parochial and sentimental, then we are indeed a glitteringly intelligent and discerning public.

Does any of this matter? Not really. Celebrities take part in these shows to raise their profiles, and they don't have to win to do that. Likewise, ordinary people take part in order to attract the attention of talent spotters, and they can do that without actually winning also. Viewers take part for the fun of feeling involved, and if voting for someone who talks with the same accent as your own is more involving, so be it.

But might it matter a little more, when the public indicates that a highly paid public service broadcaster is not quite the national institution that the BBC thinks he is, only for the corporation to decide that its naughty middle-aged child needs protecting, no matter who else has to pay for his mistakes?

Would it be fun if the public were invited to vote on the performance of Jonathan Ross when he returns to his Friday night chat show, after his three months in purdah? No doubt we are not quite bright and discerning enough to be entrusted with a proper decision, with proper consequences, even in the world of light entertainment. And no doubt, when she had finished patronising people about their wise decisions on things that do not matter, Hazel Blears would be among the first to agree with that.

How could she do otherwise, when the real examples of people power on display this week are all on the internet? A disaffected member of the British National Party publishes a members' list, provoking an attempted arson attack. Campaigning citizens press for the names of the convicted torturers of Baby P to be named, even though the precaution is there only to protect his four living siblings. And in the US people watch a boy commit suicide, unable to tell what's real and what's fake.

No wonder people are so attached to Strictly Come Dancing and The X Factor. The outrage is harmless, the arguments are good-natured, the judgements have very limited consequences, and it keeps us all occupied. Real people power, by contrast, can be very nasty indeed.

The best high street discount: don't buy anything

The trick, I'm told, is to sift. Then all those gems that other people tell you they got from Marks & Spencer can be yours as well. But I just can't do it. I walk into a branch and the sheer volume of stuff just defeats me.

By chance I ventured in to the flagship Marble Arch store on Thursday, for some tights, expecting credit crash consumption to be sedate. Alas, it was 20 per cent off day, and the place was a seething mass of shoppers, all industriously sifting. And the heat! A frank assistant told me it was "because of all the bodies". Nice. Miraculously, without even trying, I did see a perfect dress, a beautiful scarf, and a lovely jumper. But the queues were so huge that I told myself that I didn't need another dress, another scarf, or another jumper, which was a saving not of 20 per cent, but 100 per cent.

Later, on the telly, Stuart Rose was telling the nation that he was doing all he could to help us to shop. It's very thoughtful of the M&S boss. But I'm quite grateful that he helped me, so efficiently, not to shop. Will I sneak back and buy the stuff when it's quieter? No. I just don't want it that much.

The consumer really is king now: the discounts have started, and paying full price is so last year. Who'll pay £50 today for something that was £40 on Thursday? Not the debt-laden British shopper. So, hello deflation at home, and goodbye sustainable development abroad. That's the price we'll pay for our bargains. If we stop shopping altogether, then the price gets ever bigger.

M&S just opened an underwear factory in India, where machinists are paid more than local teachers. Will I buy that stuff, full price, just in a spirit of global citizenship? Not when I don't know how long I've got my job for.

The more we take control of the local economic conditions that are within our grasp, the more out of control the big picture will become. Globalisation has never looked so scary.

Can you really subvert trivia?

The great thing, apparently, is that the viewers "subverted" 'Strictly Come Dancing', in voting for John Sergeant against the wishes of the judges. But Sergeant, pictured, has himself shown how difficult it really is to "subvert" light entertainment, by subverting the wishes of the public in turn. He bowed out, in part, it is reported, because things were rotten for him behind the scenes, not only because the judges were so rude, but also because the other celebrities resented being kicked off in his favour, even though they were better dancers. Can you subvert trivia? Not, it would seem, when the people providing the trivia are taking it all so very seriously.

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