Many of us might think at first, 'well why shouldn't he play croquet?' and, of course there is no reason, in principle, why he shouldn't.

But it is not as simple as that. Very few people think he should still be at Dorneywood in the first place. Following his affair with Tracey Temple, his diary secretary, he was stripped of all significant ministerial responsibilities. There has been a desperate attempt to make it sound as though he still is an important figure in the government because he chairs various committees. But must of us are frankly disbelieving.

We suspect the only reason he is still deputy prime minister and has been allowed to keep Dorneywood is because he represents a link to Old Labour party members and backbenchers. Or perhaps he is there as a broker between the warring factions of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. In any case, he only retains Dorneywood because of his position in the Labour Party, not because he is of any use in government. His presence at Dorneywood is an abuse of government perks for party political purposes.

The misleading comments made by members of his department add the nasty smell around this game. When his office was contacted and asked where he was, a spokeswoman reportedly said that Mr Prescott was in the Cabinet Office. It was an untruth.

When one the civil servants present at the croquet game was asked about it, he said they were 'allowed a lunch-break'. But the game - not to mention the picnic - was nowhere near lunchtime. It was mid to late afternoon.

Then, one of the civil servants claimed that, although they were hitting balls through hoops, they were actually working. She had received three faxes and made some phone calls. This has got to rank as one of the most absurd excuses ever, ranking alongside 'I was only showing her how springy the bed is' .

The simple fact is that the deputy prime minister on £134,000 a year plus many perks, got five civil servants and security men - probably all of them on the public payroll - to play a game with him during the hours when they should have been working. You and I and the old lady paying tax on an income below the the government's own poverty line were all paying the salaries of these people. Mr Prescott exemplifies the way that the government has lost sight of the idea that it has a responsibility not to waste our money.

John Prescott now seems to think that anything he does must be OK because he is so important a national figure. He acts like a feudal lord. The idea, expressed by Tony Blair when Labour came to power, that they were all servants of the people has been forgotten.

It is strange to recall that a decade ago John Prescott was regarded as a formidable political figure. I was once told my a BBC producer that Tory MPs would back out of radio and TV debates when they heard they were going to be up against him. He helped Tony Blair get through the abolition of Clause Four, thus helping to change the ethos of the Labour Party. He talked then about 'integrated transport system' and people thought he know what he was talking about'.

But the longer that Labour has been in power, the lower John Prescott's reputation has fallen. As Transport Secretary, his main action was to stop authorising new road-building and even to cancel plans that were already in place. He left the busiest section of the M25 in gridlock and it was not until he was replaced that the desperately-needed authorisation for a new lane came through.

He has been an appalling minister, everywhere he has gone. He promoted regional assemblies that nobody wanted. His latest responsibility has been in planning. All surveys of the kind of housing people actually want have indicated that they would like houses with gardens. But he has opted instead for high-density housing - the greatest number of 'units' in the smallest possible space. He has boasted that he is developing 'brownfield' sites. It has now emerged that a significant portion of these brownfield sitea are existing houses and their gardens. Over the past 15 years, front gardens in London equivalent to 22 Hyde Parks have been concreted over. He has played a major role in doing away with the high-quality housing which his predecessor, Nye Bevan, insisted upon.

So what do we have? A man whose ministerial career has been a series of bungles that have embarrassed even the prime minister. A man who has clung to office and to his perks like a limpet. Where other principled Old Labour figures like Robin Cook resigned on one issue or another, Mr Prescott's greatest principle has been to hold onto his country estate. Even Labour backbenchers may have had enough of him, with unconfirmed reports of that some are gathering together to ask for him to be replaced.

He betrayed his wife with his sordid affair, thus taking the charm out of his self-indulgence. He is just out for what he can get. He has moved from being a rough diamond, to being a bit of joke and finally an embarrassment.

Mr Prescott should go. And go now.

The above is the unedited version of my article in the Daily Express today.

I might add, incidentally, that Mr Prescott once telephoned me from Dorneywood. I had written an article for the Daily Mail in which I accused the government of being 'anti-car'. We talked about the M25 and I argued it desperately needed another lane and perhaps more. He wanted to know what 'evidence' I had that this would improve matters. I am not a transport expert who can cite studies of car behaviour. I am of course aware of the argument that traffic increases to fill the roadspace available. But it is a simple commonsense point that a four-lane road can carry a bigger volume of traffic faster than a three-lane road. This, of course, has indeed proved to be the case, since the M25 in the area between the M4 and the M3 has been widened. The flow has considerably improved.

He said 'what if then there are still jams on the road? When do we stop building lanes?' Having driven in the USA where there are roads with five and more lanes, I could see no reason in principle why a further lane or two could not be built if necessary. But the point which he, like most people in Britain, have not cottoned on to is that we are approaching saturation point of car use in Britain. The big jump in usage is already in the bag. The vast majority of households use cars. The quantity of car usage simple cannot increase by the same proportion again. It is a pity to give up on roads when we are so close to having enough. (I am referring to cross-country travel here, of course, not travel within city centres which are a different matter.)