WOULD THE REAL ALAN JOHNSON PLEASE STAND UP

So welcome aboard to Alan Johnson, international man of mystery.
We met when the new Education Secretary took his first tour of a couple of schools in the hot sunshine of Hackney on Thursday afternoon.
Disappointingly, he wasn't wearing those fetching shades, pictured on the front of The Times the day after Blair's reshuffle.
But he was no less enigmatic without the dark glasses.
The former postman and union boss was asked whether he was the first Education Secretary not to have a degree. He replied: "And I might be the only Secretary of State who was on free school meals."
Impeccable left-wing credentials, you see.
Yet a little later, he had a blunt message for those comrades at the eastern outposts of the Labour Party: he would not be watering down the Education Bill to please them.
In fact, he seemed more interested in keeping the Tories on side.
As if to prove the point Johnson went on to lavish praise on his Conservative counterpart, David Willetts. David, he said, is a "talented" politician with "bags of integrity". Many would no doubt agree.
But as for Johnson, he seems to be a man who might be able to appeal to the old left and the bright young things in the progressive centre of British politics at the same time.
Perhaps all those commentators tipping him for the highest office in the land may have had a point after all.