I ATTENDED the two minutes’ silence on Armistice Day in Westbury, a remembrance service at Imber on Saturday and Remembrance Sunday services in Trowbridge and Warminster.

It seems to me that every year the number of people turning out to pay their respects increases and I am heartened by it. My fear is that when, as we very much hope it will, the tempo of operations reduces and we no longer see nightly on our TV screens accounts of our men and women in action, we will neglect to honour people in the way that we have rediscovered since 2003.

Elizabeth I’s great statesman William Cecil observed soldiers in peace are “like chimneys in summer”.

I’m not sure if he was being cynical or rueful but the truth is that warriors and the obligation we owe them tend to be forgotten when the shooting stops.

James Murdoch had another light toasting at the hands of the Commons media select committee.

Labour MP Tom Watson was presumably relying on parliamentary privilege when he accused Mr Murdoch of being a mafia boss.

In my view he overstepped the mark as the man has not, up to this point, been convicted of the criminality implied by Mr Watson’s indecorous, if colourful, language. One senses the hacking scandal has some considerable way to run and that, when the dust settles, it won’t just be the unlamented News of The World on the scrap heap.

The cost of borrowing for the UK is historically low compared to our closest continental European neighbour. Poor France is paying the price of being part of the Eurozone. But we should not be smug. Half our trade is with Europe. But we should rejoice that the extraordinary Silvio Berlusconi has finally thrown in the towel. The Italian economy may be chaotic but, unlike Greece, it is big enough to drag us down.

The only solution I can see is for the Eurozone to move towards a greater fiscal union that, of course, will not involve the UK.

Brussels should stop pretending Amsterdam and Athens are the same and sort out pathetic European economies in which paying tax is a voluntary activity and where people expect to retire in their early 50s.