This may explain why the party has a membership of only 500 people. And so I turn to the Church of England for purposeful advice on how to vote holy - and discover news that will warm Mr Ashdown's heart. Only one member of the House of Bishops is a member of any political party... and yes, he is a Liberal Democrat.THE sorry sell-out of the Left, you might suppose, is a well-charted map Not so. According to the latest edition of the party's newsletter, Socialist Standard, not even Jesus himself would have been good enough to get in.

Christians and other weak-minded fools are, they declare, too busy dreaming of the afterlife to devote themselves to the socialist struggle Sorry, Mr Blair The party's standards are rigorous in the extreme. For the Socialist Party of Great Britain, those great keepers of the flame based down in Clapham, last week's confession of faith from Tony Blair (pictured left) was but further evidence of new Labour's disgrace. The Socialist Party has just reaffirmed its outright ban on religious believers of any persuasion joining its ranks. One leading businessman and long-time Labour supporter in Leeds was not, I regret, impressed. "What? Seventy-five pounds to cross the Pennines to listen to him? I'd need paying to cross the road to hear him speak Bugger off!"n GOD, I can reveal, votes Liberal Democrat. This is the only reasonable conclusion to be reached, after an Easter Week of unseemly tussles over where the Almighty would put his cross So to speak.

What a shame, then, to read in the House of Commons notices about another new group by the name of Progress. Let us hope the two are not confused - for the latter, I understand, is "a self-help group of former prostate cancer patients" Proof, at last, of a widely held contention. The Blair brigade, as we suspected, are indeed talking out of their less articulate orifices. PETER Mandelson's courtship of the business world is not, alas, going smoothly. Letters were recently dispatched to "select figures in business and industry", inviting them to a special presentation of the ideas contained in his book, The Blair Revolution Tickets are a snip, at pounds 75. n A MOST embarrassing misfortune has befallen the exciting new Blairite baby, Progress.

This recently formed "educational trust" is the product of Peter Mandelson's dark protege, Derek Draper - a man, one might have thought, who should know a bit about slick PR. A regime, in fact, remarkably similar to that prescribed for beating cellulite Gentlemen, there will be no excuse for baldness in future. Stolen glimpses of dome will be blown up in the tabloids, as glaring proof of our public figures letting themselves go - and while this is probably not what is normally meant by sexual equality, I am wholeheartedly in favour. Balding, we were told, can be beaten! One must merely "make a commitment to a lifestyle change" - raw vegetables, lots of cold water, and, in extremis, hanging of self upside-down daily.