Eight things from Parliament...

Peers shared tales of derring-do, espionage and betrayal on Monday, as they called on the government to create a memorial to the heroism of the women who risked their lives working for the special operations executive (SOE) during the Second World War.

Women in World War II debate in full

Tributes were paid to the courage of Nancy Wake, a British woman who led a band of 7,000 French resistance fighters during the liberation of France, once killing an SS man with her bare hands.

She was known as the White Mouse because she was so good at hiding and escaping, Conservative peer and former Bletchley Park code-breaker Baroness Trumpington revealed.

One of the White Mouse's colleagues was Noor Inayat Khan, an Indian Muslim who was the first female SOE agent to be airdropped into occupied France.

Lord West, a Labour peer and former Royal Navy chief, said she had far exceeded her expected lifespan in occupied Paris, sending back vital information by radio from Paris for three months.

But she was betrayed by the jealous girlfriend of a comrade, said Labour's Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, and was captured, tortured and executed in 1944.

A memorial to Noor Inayat Khan is under construction and will be located in Gordon Square in London.

"However, she is one of a few of the 39 women SOE agents, of whom 13 died, to be thus recognised," Lib Dem peer Baroness Brinton said.

David Cameron told MPs that Prince Philip is "worshipped as a god" by islanders in a part of Vanuatu

As MPs sang the praises of the Duke of Edinburgh ahead of his 90th birthday, with glowing tributes to his good humour, pioneering youth awards scheme and distinguished wartime naval service, a lone voice wondered aloud whether the royals would find it "sickening" to hear such "sycophancy".

Avowed republican and Labour MP Paul Flynn asked his colleagues: "Are members of the royal family superior beings to the rest of us? Are we inferior beings to them?"

Despite the MP's rhetorical intent, his questions prompted a loud chorus of "yes!" from around the chamber.

Meanwhile in the Lords, the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, described Prince Philip as an "example to us all", revealing that he shares his birthday with the duke.

Boiling your kettle during half time in a key televised sporting event could cost more than doing so ten minutes earlier under possible ideas aimed at managing future energy demands, we learned during an Energy Committee hearing on Tuesday.

There was indignation in the upper chamber on Monday at the UK Payments Council's proposal to phased out cheques.

As Treasury spokesman Lord Sassoon declared that, in the government's view, there needed to be a "paper-based system" to replace them if they were eradicated, Labour's Lord Hughes wondered what "on earth" was the point.

Shadow Commons leader Hilary Benn lampooned the government at business questions on Thursday over its delayed publication of the Higher Education White Paper, claiming that it had first been mooted over a year ago and had therefore taken longer "to gestate" than a donkey and almost as long as a camel.

His counterpart Sir George Young remarked that Mr Benn's performances at the despatch box were outshining those of opposition leader Ed Miliband at PMQs.

MEP Francisco Sosa-Wagner spoke of "restoring the honour of the cucumber"

Pictures of a cucumber-brandishing MEP were beamed around the world after the European Parliament demanded compensation for Spanish farmers whose sales were hit by false claims that their cucumbers were to blame for a deadly outbreak of E. coli in Germany.

But MEPs were also aggravated this week by the prospect of "stress testing" nuclear facilities to prevent the recent crisis at Japan's Fukushima plant being repeated in Europe. German Green MEP Rebecca Harms dismissed the plans as a "paper check" designed to "downplay the risks of nuclear power". But her comments were described by fellow German MEP Herbert Reul as "naive".

Two cabinet members have testified at select committee hearings this week: Business Secretary Vince Cable and Defence Secretary Liam Fox. The Defence Committee also gathered evidence from senior military figures as part of its inquiry on the Strategic Defence and Security Review and the National Security Strategy. Nuclear safety, in the light of events in Japan, was the subject when the chief inspector of nuclear installations, Dr Mike Weightman appeared before the energy and climate change committee on Thursday.

8) Other highlights of the week

There was also of course PM's questions, in Westminster; First Minister's Questions in Scotland, while in Wales The Queen officially opened the fourth assembly , and in Stormont David Cameron addressed the Northern Ireland Assembly on Thursday.

There was a Ten Minute Rule Bill proposing that it be made easier for grandparents and siblings to take on parental responsibilities if a parent is unable to look after their child. And finally there was an opposition half-day debate on the impact of government policies on women.

Compiled by Democracy Live's Ed Lowther

democracylive@bbc.co.uk

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