DEREK JAMESON

Yes, I'm talking to Lord Archer, who happens to be a friend of mine. That's a rather awkward situation since I've been editor of both the Daily Star and the News of the World, newspapers at the centre of the latest sensation.

Let me be honest and admit I could have kept Jeffrey out of his present troubles had he called me for some professional advice. This is how I see it:

Thirteen years after the event, TV producer Ted Francis, now 66, made several phone calls to Archer to discuss the letter he wrote to the peer's solicitor giving a false alibi for the night in 1986 when Archer was alleged by the Daily Star to have bedded prostitute Monica Coughlan.

Those calls were recorded by the News of the World and Archer damned himself by such responses as "There's no proof this is a porkie."

His words were all the evidence the News of the World needed to break the shock news that Archer had manufactured a false alibi.

In my view, had he kept quiet and merely grunted as his old friend Francis raked over the past then the News of the World would have found it difficult to run the story, bearing in mind Archer had previously collected £500,000 from the Daily Star for libel.

You see, the Star had got the dates mixed up - in the way newspapers do - and Francis' spurious account of having dinner with Archer became redundant and was never mentioned in court.

Without Archer's own corroboration in those phone calls the newspaper would have found this complex situation very dodgy legally. Wrong dates, unheard evidence. Not likely.

Now Fleet Street is talking of Archer being charged and possibly going to jail. I don't see it myself.

The jury found in Archer's favour and their verdict will encourage him to hang on to the Star's £500,000 plus £700,000 costs. The Star's mistake was to claim Archer had slept with Coughlan while the News of the World's initial report was limited to allegations surrounding £2,000 an Archer aide tried to hand over to her.

Mind you, had I put my views to Archer I doubt he would have taken any notice. He called me for advice on the Sunday morning that the News of the World broke the Coughlan story and I told him what he must do.

He didn't take any notice of that, either, and I felt sure we were about to witness the end of Jeffrey's political career. With his millions it shouldn't matter much I thought to myself. It mattered to him though.

Yet again he fought his way back to the top of the Tory ladder.

He won't be so lucky this time, I fancy.

JOY BUT MILLIONS ARE UPSET

I HOPE the nation's cheers of delight at the addition to the Blair family don't drown out warning voices about significant shifts in public opinion over the latest twists and turns in Government policy.

Tony Blair would do well to remember that the Tories were riding high through the Thatcher years and beyond, but came a cropper when they lost all sense of direction over the economy and Britain's role in Europe.

New Labour hasn't won many friends with its petty attempt to destroy Ken Livingstone's credibility while seeking nomination in the election for Mayor of London, though polls suggest he's the people's favourite.

Jack Straw, the Home

Secretary, hasn't helped Labour's cause with his proposals for mandatory drug testing of suspects and restrictions on the right to choose trial by jury.

If all that isn't enough, most media commentators say the Government has declared war on the motorist and those concerned with the poor and needy reckon Labour has driven a stake through the heart of the

welfare state.

Everyone is uplifted up by Cherie Blair's good news, but in the shadows there are fears that in one extraordinary week of highs and lows the Government has disaffected its new middle class supporters as well as traditional working class voters.

It's early days, but any party that hits 26 million motorists with more costs and tougher parking laws must surely suffer a massive backlash at the polls.

I WAS A FOOL TO SHOUT

Lulu has always been dear to my heart so I hope she rises above all the flak coming her way as presenter of Red Alert, the recycled National Lottery show on BBC TV.

I didn't think she was that bad, even if the critics did go into mourning for the passing of her career.

Lulu and I go back a long way. It began in 1963 when her father, a Glasgow butcher, brought his daughter to London and paid miracle worker Les Perrin £1,000 - a tidy sum then - to launch his 15-year-old daughter on her chosen career as a pop singer.

Les, then the top publicist in show business, invited me and some other some journalist pals to the Wig and Pen club in Fleet Street. After a good lunch, he hit us with Lulu's first record - Shout!

What did we think of it?

When my turn came to give a verdict, I said emphatically: "No chance. You don't think the British public are going to pay good money to be shouted at?" I've been feeling guilty about it ever since.

Hats off to the homeless

TOP marks to the lost souls among us for the way they protected schoolgirls Rebecca O'Keefe and Emma Douglas, whose six days as runaways included several freezing hours trying to sleep on the beach near the Palace Pier.

Inspired by the Channel Four series Staying Lost, they ran away for a classroom dare before making their way home to Wokingham, Berkshire, after a nationwide search failed to find them.

That they came to no harm was largely due to the down-and-outs and homeless they encountered on their travels, who warned of the serious dangers they faced roaming the streets.

Brighton was very much part of the Staying Lost series, though Channel Four reckons it was meant to deter youngsters from leaving home. The bright lights and romantic notions of sleeping under the stars have always been a magnet for runaways. But, as Rebecca and Emma found, a few hours of sub-zero temperatures soon puts paid to that image.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.