One of the great pleasures of political gambling is when you find situations where whatever happens you end up a winner. With the news in the Sun today that David Blunkett will return to the Cabinet if Tony Blair wins the election then an interesting situation opens up.

The current best price on Blunkett returning during 2005 is 4/1 which, given the Sun’s status as almost the “official mouthpiece of New Labour” for such things, makes that the best bet there is on Labour winning the General Election. It’s certainly much better value than the 1/6 best price that’s available on Labour winning most seats.

To cover yourself what about combining the bet with the 7/2 that’s still available on Tony Blair’s tenure as Prime minister ending during 2005?

So if Blair stays you should win on the Blunkett bet – if he goes you win on the end of tenure bet.

If just one of these bets comes up you make a profit and the risk of both falling down must be a lot lower than the profit you make at 7/2 and 4/1. There’s also a possibility that you could win on both.

This is not a true arbitrage because it is just feasible that Blair will still be at Number 10 and Blunkett will not be in the Cabinet. But the Sun story is pretty strong and it’s not often that it gets one of these wrong. There’s also the risk of the election being postponed beyond January 1 2006. But this is worth the punt.

Get on while this is still available.