I’m not exactly sure where I stand on the matter of apologies for long standing wrongs. The idea of, say, a US president apologising for slavery makes no sense to me, but the idea of former white leaders of South Africa saying sorry for their actions during the Apartheid era does make sense.

Similarly, the idea of Gordon Brown apologising for the actions of previous governments in their shoddy treatment of Alan Turing doesn’t exactly sit right. If you’ve studied the history of computing, you’ll know about Turing, and most folk who do speak in slightly reverential, hushed tones about him. The man was a revolutionary mind. But you can’t be a human being without thinking that the laws that condemned him were farking stupid, and grossly wrong.

But is it the fault of today’s prime mentalist to apologise for the laws of the land as they stood fifty years ago? Hell, Brown was barely playing with his little cloven feet and pitchfork at the time of the conviction.

It’s really just another example of the misdirection of that Downing Street petitions site. Example: it took 30,870 to sign to get Brown to apologise. But the 70,866 who’ve signed up to ask Brown to resign are still disappointed.

So, does he listen to the population when it matters, or only when meaningless words are involved. You decide…