Weighing up the competing claims, the judge said PC Rowland was "not the sort of man who would have had the wit, imagination or inclination to invent on the spur of the moment an account of what a senior politician had said to him in temper".

He added that gaps and inconsistencies in PC Rowland's account did not demonstrate he had fabricated his account, as Mr Mitchell's lawyers claimed.

Ah, you have a rotten day and then something comes along to cheer you right up. Now if we can just get Grant Schapps caught in some sort of tabloid scandal and into bankruptcy, the world will be a sunnier place.