EVEN if, from the perspective of most of the country, the contest for the mayor of London is but a political sideshow, the ludicrous convolutions that have accompanied the efforts of both Labour and the Conservatives to find an official candidate have made it already the best spectacle of the pantomime season by far.

Coming amid continual claims of murky manoeuvrings in Labour's selection procedure, the latest development - the brouhaha that has erupted among the Tories over the axing by the "blue-rise brigade" of ex-minister Steven Norris from the short-list because of his extra-marital affairs - gives us another sharp insight into the desperation of parties to beguile the voters.

The laughable thing about Mr Norris's blackballing by just a dozen votes of the 20-strong selection committee is that, hitherto, the Tories were at least behaving far more democratically than Labour. It may be that their one-member, one-vote system had originally given them the now-disgraced Lord Archer despite his time-bomb credentials being apparent to all but the most heedless and that the eager endorsement of him by William Hague has covered the leadership in egg, but at least this spectacular naM- vet contrasted healthily with the fix engineered by Labour chiefs to ultimately prevent the maverick Ken Livingstone from being their candidate even though he is well ahead in the opinion polls.

Now, ridiculously, a tiny covey chops the chances of the original runner-up, Mr Norris, who, arguably, of all the new contenders, is the only one voters have heard of. The frankness of Ken Livingstone in thanking them for eliminating the only Tory whom Labour feared having to fight sums up the extent of the political folly - a manifest desire to lose cleanly.

But while attention to it may be distracted a little by renewed claims today that Labour party headquarters had given unfair help to the Blair-blessed hopeful, former health minister Frank Dobson, the question that is bound to arise in the minds of many voters, in and out of London, is whether the Tories, still in manifest turmoil, will do even worse at the next general election when they cannot get their act together for a sideshow.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.