Icepick anyone?

“To betray”, noted Kim Philby, “you must first belong”.

WCh doesn’t like traitors. Of any kind. Politicians ratting on their parties and crossing the floor is never over principle. So the defection of Lib Dem MEP, Sajad Karim, to ‘David Cameron’s Conservatives’ is of a long tradition of ignoble acts of self-preservation and self-aggrandisement by the politically self-deluded.

Just as Philby eked out his old age in a Moscow flat after he had outlived his usefulness to the KGB, so , too, Mr Karim, (who has only recently discovered that, like his new hero, he too was “a liberal Conservative”), will never be trusted by his new 'comrades'.

But political treachery cuts both ways. The sight of plummy toff defector, Quintin Davies, at the rostrum of September’s Labour conference almost made your humble correspondent vomit into his flat cap. Equally sick-making was the reaction of the twenty-something arriviste barrow boys of New Labour who rose to their feet to cheer this hero of socialism.

In a lobotomised political culture, where conviction and ideology counts for nought, WCH predicts these type of shenanigans will become ever more common.

Make no mistake it will be Labour’s turn soon. For every Alan Howarth, Shaun Woodward, Peter Temple-Morris and Quintin Davies there will be some Labour chancer in a marginal seat offered a golden parachute into a safe Tory berth or a perch in the Lords. Especially if the current polls stretch into a grisly trend.

Then what? Will Labour politicians call for them to resign their seat? Bit late then.

No, traitors should never prosper. If a politician cannot abide either party or policy then they should have the decency to sit as an independent. Or resign.

Interestingly, I gather the first Karim’s constituency staffer knew about his interesting career move was when their contract was terminated by letter.

Funny thing, principles.