SUCKED ever-deeper into the torrid "weapons-of-mass-destruction" whirlpool of its own creation, the Government nevertheless still has other urgent fish to fry.

And no, I'm not talking about foxhunting, which is invariably, but in my view wrongly, put up as evidence of the Government fiddling while Britain burns.

If foxhunting's claim on Parliamentary time falls as far behind that of schools, hospitals, transport, crime, asylum etc, as critics claim, why would the Tories have already committed themselves to revoking a ban on their return to office - when their first priority should be to sort out schools, hospitals, transport, crime, asylum etc?

No, the "issue" that must be dealt with amid the WMD maelstrom is the occupation of part of Parliament Square by a 54-year-old anti-war campaigner who has been there for two years.

Sitting in front of banners and boards with newspaper cuttings, Brian Haw harangues ministers through a megaphone: "Loony Tune Hoon.'' "Man of Straw.'' "Thieves, Murderers, Liars.'' Of course it's not nice and doesn't look, or sound, pretty. But Haw, who began by simply fasting and praying in protest against economic sanctions in Iraq, has beefed up his act in the face of indifference. His protest might therefore be taken as mirroring the impotence now felt by many in what has become our charade of democracy. Haw's period of prayer-protest saw Britain invade Afghanistan and Iraq.

Now more visible and vocal, he can no longer be tolerated. A law is being put through Parliament specially to allow the local council to evict him. The steam hammer cracks a nut, though perhaps not a nutter. And that is certainly true of another nut that the hammer will incidentally crush.

For alongside Mr Haw is a man in a wheelchair - "Christopher". He is on his third hunger strike to highlight the scandalously-low compensation, £6,000, that he received after being hit by a car and paralysed from the waist down. Mr Haw cares for him - puts him to bed and attends to the catheter tube he must wear.

You might have thought that the compensation of £25,000 awarded to a woman who claimed her Caribbean holiday was spoiled by such faults as a too-low bedroom mirror and a broken ice-maker might have been an opportunity for an MP to make the point that many victims of accidents or crimes are very inadequately compensated. But no MP bothered.

We little people don't count. Once every four or five years we are allowed to put a cross on a piece of paper. But if we turn awkward meanwhile we can be either safely ignored - or stamped on. Parliament's eponymous Square now shows both methods in operation.

AMONG the rapidly dwindling (i.e. fast dying-off) minority of cricket traditionalists, I detest the coloured clothing of the modern First Class one-day game. But the idea behind the garish outfits, to emphasise the competitive element, is fair enough even though it sacrifices cricket as an especially lovely part of the pageant of summer. Yet in last weekend's semi-final of the new Twenty20 Cup, both Surrey and Gloucester wore blue. Earlier two opposing counties turned out in black. If a single colour is worn by both sides, why forsake white?