All change? No change.

It has just occurred to me, whilst reading yet again about how this is the first US election in decades where no incumbent President or Vice-President is contesting it, that the next election here in the UK (whenever the one eyed git deigns to allow it) will also be something of a first, at least for a good few years. Because not one of those people heading up the three main parties has fought an election as party leader before. You have to go right back to 1979 to find a similar scenario.

And it is tempting to look back to 1979 and hope that we will see a similar, radical change to British politics. After all, in 1979 we had an incompetent former Labour Chancellor who had become Prime Minister in the wake of the resignation of a much more popular, electable and eloquent Labour leader. That former Chancellor had postponed an election, thus sealing the fate of his government. In 2008, we have the same scenario - it is just the name of the PM has changed.

However, that (sadly) is where the similarity ends. Because whilst the fall of Ming Campbell does bring a smile to my jaundiced, cynical lips, it is nowhere near as dramatic as the fall of Jeremy Thorpe. But even more strikingly you have the difference in Tory leaders. In 1979, the Tory leader was a woman of conviction, who had radical ideas on how to improve the UK. In 2008 the Tories are being led by a man who seems to be happy to be called the "heir to Blair", when we all know that such a tag should be sending any self respecting Tory to the car with a length of hosepipe and some gaffer tape.

Would it be too much to hope for that with such a massive change in the leadership of the main parties in the UK that there would be a similar massive change in the policies of those parties? Sadly, in the Britain of 2008, the answer is "yes."