McCarthyite it wasn’t. Joe McCarthy was terrifying — people killed themselves because of him and folk like him — but this was pathetic. The government whip’s letter to university vice-chancellors requesting a list of names of professors “involved in the teaching of European affairs, with particular reference to Brexit”, was never likely to elicit anything other than a brusque counter-invitation and then ridicule.

It was the reaction of a minister that gave me pause. Asked about it on the Today programme, Jo Johnson gave an almost laughable explanation. Chris Heaton-Harris had “long-term interests in the history of European thought” and was thinking of writing a book about it. Hence the letter.

Chris Heaton-Harris’s letter was always going to lead to ridicule GEOFF PUGH/REX FEATURES

I’ve written some books. One of the things you say when you’re asking for