On this Dacre in history - can he resist?

Paul Dacre's appointment to investigate access to public documents has certainly raised a few wry chuckles in Fleet Street. It's not hard to see it as a cunning ploy by Gordon Brown to buy Dacre's loyalty - or at least to get him to tone down the anti-Labour vitriol that so enraged Tony Blair and Alastair Campbell. The mutual respect between the two is well known, though Dacre would never lose touch with Mail readers' conservatism by going so far as to endorse Brown. What's in it for Dacre, though? Well, he gets a bit of glory and prestige. But think of the secrets he might uncover. What journalist could turn down the chance to help unearth government papers over the past 30 years? And Brown would hardly mind any dirty laundry coming out of Dacre's trawl: the juicy documents will cover the 18 years of Tory government and the 10 years under his great rival Tony Blair.