One way commentators have found to sum up the chaos of the last few years in politics is to say, “It’s like something out of The Thick of It".

Sky News’ Sophy Ridge reached for the comparison when explaining the row over WhatsApp messages being given to the Covid inquiry.

The inquiry wants all messages, including those of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, to be handed over unredacted. It will then decide what is relevant.

The UK Government says no, it will decide on relevance. The dispute is now inching toward court.

In the meantime, Mr Johnson has gone ahead off his own bat and sent unredacted material to retired judge Baroness Hallett, head of the inquiry.

In response, the Sunday Times reported, the Government has told Mr Johnson he won’t get his legal bills paid by the taxpayer if he “undermines the government’s position”.

With Westminster on its half-term break last week, MPs had lots of time to go on WhatsApp themselves to speculate about what was going on.

Was the Johnson camp trying to force Rishi Sunak’s hand, believing the Prime Minister has the most to lose from embarrassing messages?

It was left to Robert Jenrick to tour the Sunday politics shows in defence of redactment. Mr Jenrick’s regular job is immigration, but handily enough, as he pointed out to any Sunday show host that would listen, he was also a lawyer in a previous life. No court would go on such a general trawl for information, he insisted.

Speaking on Ridge on Sunday, he said if Boris Johnson wished to send his documents or WhatsApp messages to the inquiry he was at liberty to do so.

“He can advance whatever arguments he wants to and make whatever statements he wishes in his witness statement to the inquiry.

“There’s absolutely no sense that the Government will restrict what Boris Johnson wants to say, but if you use taxpayer funds obviously you should make sure you’re using them appropriately.”

He denied there were fears in No 10 that Rishi Sunak’s messages could reveal a plot to try to bring down Mr Johnson, saying: “No, as I say, the issue here is a simple legal one.”

WhatsApp came up on BBC Scotland’s The Sunday Show during an interview with Alister Jack.

Besides being Secretary of State for Scotland, Mr Jack is also close to Boris Johnson. He was part of the crowd of well-wishers who turned out in Downing Street to say cheerio to the former PM and his wife.

Asked whether Rishi Sunak should hand over his WhatsApp messages, Mr Jack was firmly on the side of the new boss rather than the old.

“Any details going to [the inquiry] should be relevant to Covid. I don’t think anyone in the country is going to think that WhatsApp messages that the Prime Minister shared with his wife or anyone else should be going to the Covid inquiry,” he told host Martin Geissler.

The main subject of the interview was the row between Mr Jack and the Scottish Government over the bottle deposit scheme, and Westminster-Holyrood friction in general.

The Sunday Show is no stranger to heated debates, but they usually happen on the programme. Not so on Saturday. The following tale is one to file under “N” for no good deed goes unpunished.

Someone at the BBC thought viewers would like to know who was on the show. A tweet was sent listing guests by name and title. But there was an omission. Jenny Gilruth, the Scottish Education Secretary, was listed as plain Jenny Gilruth, while Alister Jack was given his full bells and whistles title as “Sec of State for Scotland”.

Ms Gilruth was quick to pick up on this, as were a number of other unhappy tweeters, and got in touch with the BBC. The tweet was promptly corrected and sent out again, for which Ms Gilruth said thanks.

You might have thought that was quite enough excitement for a sunny day but no. Others piled in, accusing the BBC of bias.

In contrast, one tweeter wanted to know why Ms Gilruth was listed before Mr Jack. Wasn’t that biased?

The argument rumbled on and at one point included Michael Russell, SNP President. Calling the BBC’s original post “wholly indefensible”, he added: “This isn’t just incompetence. It is also deliberate disdain and bias.”

Also joining in was Blair McDougall, former campaign director of Better Together, who said, “The paranoia isn’t a grassroots thing. It’s top to bottom in nationalism.”

Scottish politics – if there’s an empty house we’ll start a fight in it.