WHETHER or not Michael Portillo's decision to seek a return to Westminster is, as some plot-seeking pundits predict, the start of a process to oust Tory leader William Hague, there are some other intriguing interludes to be observed first - now that the business is coloured by Mr Portillo's admissions of a homosexual past.

Times may have changed, but by how much in deeply Conservative and conservative Kensington and Chelsea where Mr Portillo wants to be the party's candidate is the big question.

Will its members there be as tolerant as the times are supposed now to be?

That is the first hurdle he must leap.

And if he does, the second will be winning over the party's grassroots.

Will they welcome back Mr Portillo as a potential front-bench spokesman and possible leader, now that he has revealed his gay past?

The return or otherwise of Michael Portillo may be as much an interesting test of moral attitudes as it is of political choices.

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