Mr Rossel and his fellow supergovernors are a rising class, but the new arrangement that gives them increasing clout in the centre is not backed by unfetteredpower over their fiefs at home.
The committee also called for the Auditor General to be allowed the "unfettered power" to audit the Financial Services Authority's work, given the billions of pounds of taxpayers' money that was now tied up in the banking system.
Among the cathedral's treasures are the remains of martyrs who died for the Roman faith at the hands of a Protestant state. (Protestants were killed by Catholics too, of course, but earlier.) Even in its finest bastions, Catholic England does not feel a place grown arrogant on a diet of unfetteredpower.