PLEASE bring back the numerous and completely uninteresting reports about the rift and divorce of Madonna and Guy Ritchie.

Why? Because at least it is better than hearing one more word or seeing one more time the same clips over and over again of the Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross row.

The amount of airtime and column inches (yes, I realise these are more but I’m really quite worked up about this) that have been devoted to this subject in the last week are in directly inverse proportion to the actual amount of public interest being served.

Perhaps, over the coming months of economic gloom and misery, celebrities (minor and otherwise) should be issued with a warning about the fact that any little thing that happens to them may serve as a story on the grounds that it will give people something to tut about other than money. The search for any news story that has no link to the grim reality of personal finance will be jumped on.

The trouble with having 24-hour news channels has been thrown into sharp relief this week with this particular story. Wednesday was probably the worst day. No matter what of import was going on around the world, every ten minutes on Sky News the same clip of Brand leaving his house was shown. When you have a show that is on every minute of every day then every one of those minutes has to be filled – whether there is anything to actually report or not. And, wow, has everyone pounced on this one.
At least with the Madonna-Ritchie thing some of us have had some experience of divorce. Fewer of us will have:

1. Had sex with Russell Brand – even given his own boasts about his appetite and promiscuity.
2. Had the opportunity to leave offensive, on-air messages on a famous person’s answering machine.

More of us might, I suppose, have left ill-advised messages but since this doesn’t really back my argument or my righteous anger, I’ll leave that thought there.

The point is that the pair made a gross error of judgment. One has apologised properly, the other a little churlishly, but what did anyone really expect of Russell Brand?

Do we really, honestly need puerile and day-long discussions with ‘experts’ about whether or not they should be sacked for leaving a message on the answerphone of the grandfather of a burlesque dancer saying that one of them had had sex with her. Eventually, Sky even wheeled out that expert for all occasions, Max Clifford, who has now wormed his way in as Georgina Baillie’s (the granddaughter in question) spokesman.

It is perfectly true that the broadcast was offensive and in bad taste but it is not exactly a million miles from what most radio show presenters are doing at the moment.

The vogue is, however horrible, for fairly offensive or cringeworthy phone calls. It just so happens that the grandpa in this instance happened to be the actor who played Manuel in Fawlty Towers, Andrew Sachs. Yes, it was offensive and stupid and horribly embarrassing (in a ‘yuck, my grandpa knows who I’ve had sex with’ kind of way) but is it worthy of sackings, resignations or Max Clifford?

Is prolonging this story and revealing ever more lurid pictures of Mr Sachs’s granddaughter really soothing the situation? The people who really looked foolish in all this, from the beginning and without the shock, horror headlines, were Brand and Ross. Isn’t that enough punishment in their game? Given the hand-wringing and grovelling now going on at the BBC it would appear not.

It is worth noting that the vast majority of the complaints made about the broadcast were made once it became a news story – not as a direct result of the broadcast on the day it was made. You have to wonder how many of those complaining actually listened to it.

What Brand and Ross have really done wrong is upset a national treasure who then complained. He called to complain, they apologised. That’s it. Honestly now, do you really care? Is it actually going to have any impact on your day whatsoever?

The fact is that we are fooled into thinking this is actually news by virtue of the same clips with the same voice over again and again until eventually someone else in the public eye manages to slip on a banana skin and the focus of the spotlight shifts as suddenly as it landed.

A colleague with a far more cynical mind than me suggested that Sky’s constant coverage and the prominence the story has been given in the Rupert Murdoch-owned media could be something to do with the Australian’s constant desire to take a swipe at the BBC.

There might indeed – certainly, in fact – be proper news happening somewhere on the planet but it probably isn’t as much fun as a bit of character assassination. Probably something serious rather than petty and frivolous and unlikely to make us fee guilt. With any luck by next week ‘a close friend of Madonna’s’ will have made some ‘revelations’ about Guy’s sexual performance and all will once again be right with the world.

Now, having done my bit to extend the life of the story, I will never mention it again.