It must have taken quite something to get Rupert Murdoch to cancel his visit to Davos for a glamorous economic summit and stay instead in grey and chilly London. There are, of course, a couple of vexatious problems within his British media empire, but he has not been needed here in person to sort them out. On the phone hacking allegations at the News of the World, Murdoch made clear a while ago that he condemns the practice; and News International, presumably on his instructions, now seems to be co-operating fully with the police in their new investigation. About sexism at Sky television he does not even seem to care, judging, at least, from the Guardian's leaked account of comments he made on Wednesday while attending an editorial conference at the Times. He reportedly said, in reference to sports commentator Andy Gray's deprecation of women as football officials, that "this country has lost its sense of humour" and that what Gray had said was "not worse than what women say about other women".

So it wouldn't seem that Murdoch is in London out of a desire to restore order among his unruly minions. His purpose must be a different one, and it is surely to avert the risk of failure in his attempt to acquire full control of the television network BSkyB. For Murdoch – who doesn't like losing and rarely does so – seems for once to be in danger of being thwarted. Paradoxically, the reason for this is not that the British prime minister does not want to please him, but that he seems to want to please him too much. For David Cameron seems to share the belief of Tony Blair that a condition of success in British politics is to please the world's most powerful media magnate. That mightn't matter so much if Cameron hadn't promised a more transparent and self-reliant kind of administration than the previous one but, as it is, he is looking no less deferential to Murdoch than the former Labour leader.

Cameron's first mistake was to appoint a former editor of the News of the World as his communications director, thus implying obeisance to the kind of discredited journalism that paper represents. But he made an even worse error of judgment by having dinner in Oxfordshire with Murdoch's son James and News International's chief executive, Rebekah Brooks, in the midst of the phone-hacking scandal and at a particularly sensitive moment in the battle over BSkyB. With responsibility for deciding on the outcome of that battle having passed from the anti-Murdoch Liberal Democrat minister, Vince Cable, to the pro-Murdoch Tory minister, Jeremy Hunt, Cameron should have done everything in his power to have appeared aloof. As it is, the government cannot now approve Murdoch's bid without looking like his pawn. If doing Murdoch's bidding once seemed the secret of electoral success, it now looks like being the opposite. It's a very tricky situation for Cameron, and a most unfamiliar one to Murdoch.

A game of cat and rat

Rats were spotted this week in Downing Street, scurrying to and fro between numbers 10 and 11. This greatly excited the journalists, who pestered the prime minister's press office with questions. What would the Camerons do about the rats? How would they get rid of them? Would they get a cat? The press office said vaguely that "action would be taken to deal with the issue", but emphasised that this would be done "by as humane a method as possible". I don't know what qualifies as a "humane" way of killing rats, and rats are such a despised species that I doubt if many people care. However, one obviously inhumane way would be to put a cat on to them, and this seemed to be confirmed by Downing Street's insistence for a whole day that there were "no plans" for Cameron to get one. Meanwhile, a rat-catcher was seen checking traps, which didn't seem very humane either.

At the end of the day came a sudden U-turn when the press office said that a search was now on for a cat. But concern that the Camerons might appear inhumane had been replaced by a new worry, that they might be suspected of putting a new burden on the taxpayer. "We need to work out who will pay for the cat," said a Downing Street source. "It will not be a taxpayer-expense cat." With the precious prime-ministerial image under threat from so many directions, it is amazing that anything ever gets done.

The march of incivility

Increasingly, I notice, the British are determined to do whatever authority tells them not to. This is particularly evident on the London underground, where passengers vastly prefer entrances marked No Entry to the ones they are invited to use. Any poster saying This Way and signed Mayor of London provokes a stampede along a different route. This isn't the same as dropping litter or other kinds of antisocial behaviour that are a result of laziness. It is a deliberate flouting of the rules, often carried out at some personal inconvenience. Perhaps it is our reaction to the mockery that we used to get from continental Europeans for our eagerness to comply with any official request. Perhaps we want to be free and easy like them.

We have even given up queueing. I sometimes try to queue at a bus stop, but there is never a queue to join – just a small, disorganised scrum. And this cult of incivility isn't confined to those travelling on public transport; it is just as prevalent at social gatherings. I went the other night to a grand party at Christie's for the launch of a lavish coffee-table book on the Irish country house. Copies were being sold from an antique table covered with notices asking guests not to put their wine glasses on it, but half a dozen glasses had already been plonked down beside them.