Top scribes are already leaving the Express newspaper group, purchased for £125 million sterling (€207 million) last week by porn and celebrity magazine publisher Richard Desmond.

Mr Desmond, whose titles include OK!, Asian Babes and Penthouse, is a devoted and wealthy pornocrat. Yet, confusion exists about his politics and London newspapers across the divide have claimed him as one of their own.

The right-leaning Daily Telegraph said Mr Desmond described himself as a "moderate Tory", although the leftist Guardian said he was a "socialist".

The Left has certainly softened in the Blair era but could it be that moderate conservatism is now the same as socialism?