All out of step except the minister?

Michael McDowell is entitled to think that he is doing a good job, but it is puerile on his part to dismiss his critics as “a whole load of armchair generals who know nothing”, or are “blindly ignorant of the facts”.

He complained in broadcast interviews yesterday that a group of journalists are “pursuing their own agendas” and spouting “gratuitous and offensive nonsense”.

Some of the minister’s comments sounded almost hysterically defensive.