While all eyes at Westminster are on the change of Speaker, I learn that Whitehall’s top people have been told to prepare for a ministerial reshuffle next month. “The permanent secretaries have been told to stand by and they have already started giving ratings to junior ministers,” says one Whitehall knight. He explained that once the prime minister has decided on a reshuffle, the mandarins assess the performances of those in the ministerial lower ranks. So do the party whips. The findings are then fed into the ruminations of Number 10.

Meanwhile, speculation on cabinet changes is hotting up. One tip is that Ed Balls, a favourite of Gordon Brown, prime minister, will be moved out of the Department for Children, Schools and Families, which is seen by many in Whitehall as going downhill. Mr Brown would like him to be chancellor, of course, but some Treasury insiders are sceptical about his chances. “Ed is technically very good on the economy but his political skills are another matter,” says one. “He’s a very bad speaker, he doesn’t listen when he’s being interviewed in the media and ordinary people don’t see him as a human being like them. Besides, to put Ed into the Treasury would be a terrible vote of no confidence in Alistair Darling, the present chancellor. Is that really the signal that Gordon Brown wants to send – that Alistair is not up to it?”