WILKES'S DIARY

Here's a thing. Tim Collins - youngish-looking feller, chirpy manner, chief press officer at Conservative Central Office - is blamed in the Treasury and Foreign Office for giving Johnny Major's recent speech on Europe too ``sceptic'' a spin. Bad Collins, naughty Collins, ill-informed Collins, Collins clearly out of favour with Prime Minister. Er, no, actually. For young Tim tells Wilkes that he is leaving Central Office, but not, as previously assumed, for a lucrative job in the City. He is going to Number Ten to work for... Major, J, as the new deputy head of the Policy Unit under Norman Blackwell.

This hasn't been announced yet due to the great difficulty in finding a replacement at Central Office. Well, would you want to be the Tories' PR man just at the moment? It's the job from Hell, surely. Horrible at the time and with poor prospects, too. If the Tories lose, you are an awfully convenient scapegoat and if they win, as the example of Wilkes's chum Shaun Woodward tends to show, you don't take any credit.

Incidentally, the elevation of Collins as a senior policy wonk is a sign that Major is making sure he keeps some right wing input in the policy unit. As his recent briefing showed, Collins is not exactly a supporter of the single currency. He is, however, a highly trained expert on Thunderbirds and Dr Who, and he drinks nothing stronger than Coca-Cola.The voters of Old Bexley will be delighted to hear from Wilkes that they will have the pleasure of voting for Sir Edward Heath again at the next General Election. The Father of the House, 78, in convivial mood at a Parliamentary retirement party, made it clear he had no intention of retiring.

He also seemed to relish the prospect of this Eurosceptic Government being thrown out, which will mean he will have to swap his seat below the gangway with Dennis Skinner... if Ted goes into Opposition.

John Prescott, when he became deputy leader of the People's Party, was widely believed to have the job of talking with members of the working classes, while Anthony keeps the serious Labour supporters - barristers, businessmen and Mercedes dealers - on side. But this happy division of responsibility is breaking down. Prescott has become the object of adoration among north London literary types who just love those hunky, working-boy vowels and that brooding brow. And last Friday, the People's Prescott spent his breakfast at Claridge's addressing the Business Group, a gathering of 250 businessmen who do good works for the Jewish community, providing help over and above that from the Welfare State. Anthony, by contrast, has been charging round the nation talking to the workers about nationalisation. As Prescott was tucking into croissants at Claridge's, he was on his way to St Helens to argue with Labour party activists.

The Prime Minister's reputation for wearing his underpants on the outside - making the Y-front a central political symbol of our era - has now influenced the left-wing campaign in the Labour Party to defend Clause IV.

Wilkes, a bit of a tweed boxer shorts man, finds this rather baffling. But, at any rate, Labour critics of young Anthony Blair's modernising style regard the Underpants of Office as a symbol of the Labour leader's "sell out'' of socialism - a garment that symbolises his transition into a man indistinguishable from the Prime Minister.

Alan Simpson, the chairman of the left-wing, pro-Clause IV campaign group of Labour MPs, went to the army surplus store and bought an outsize pair of Y-fronts. He has taken them on tour to 24 meetings; this week he is in Sussex and Bradford. Mr Simpson entertains his audience by announcing he is going to give them a preview of Tony Blair's election manifesto.

With that, he yanks the Y-fronts out of a bag and tells the audience they are "The Pants of Power". From now on, Wilkes is sure, it will be a sign of socialist commitment, like true Scottishness, to wear no undergarments of any kind.

But there is more. The campaign to protect Clause IV is about to hit back at Anthony's video, which has been sent to constituency parties explaining why they need to ditch the commitment to public ownership. The non-underpant- wearing Lefties are due to release their own film next week extolling the virtues of public ownership. It is no amateur effort. It has been made by Ken Loach, one of the leading left-wing "luvvies" now seriously out of sorts with Anthony's leadership.

Picture this: palms wave, azure sea glints, waves slap against the sand... and a short, red-faced man, wearing feathers on his head, is to be seen chuckling quietly. The man is the one-time Tory Chief Whip Lord (David) Waddington, who is now Governor of Bermuda - the wiggling white feathers being an essential part of the dignities of the job. Chuckling? Only because he keeps a mental list of Conservative MPs whose advance to office he blocked during the Thatcher years.

They include Tim Smith, the Member for Beaconsfield (resigned, cash-for- questions hoohah); Tim Yeo (resigned, affair); and Michael Mates (resigned over Asil Nadir's wristwatch). Tee hee, goes the Governor. Who else was on his list? Watch this space.

Wilkes makes his unsteady way to the Reform Club via Downing Street and is moved to see those stalwarts of the Thatcher era, Sir Bernard Ingham and the BBC's great John Cole, at the gates of Downing Street. They were apparently filming Cole's memoirs but seemed to have some difficulty getting into Downing Street itself. Do these policemen have no sense of history?

In the week that sees the idiosyncratic creative techniques of Yves Klein dissected in the press, Wilkes is fascinated by the endeavours of Betty Boothroyd, Speaker of the House of Commons. In the cause of Arthritis and Rheumatism Research, Bubbly Betty has created an impression of the House, mace and portcullis "in glorious nail varnish" on a dinner plate. Said plate is to be auctioned at Sotheby's in aid of the charity, and those who fear their wallets may not stretch that far will be relieved to hear that it may be commercially reproduced "as a collectors' item".