It’s back. And I can’t believe I missed it the first time. Live Theatre’s dramatisation of Chris Mullin’s diaries has returned to Soho for a lap of honour. Richly deserved as well. The show moves unobtrusively between Mullin’s many spheres of interest. We see his home life as a father of two and as MP for Sunderland South. And we get an insider’s view of Westminster during the glory days of New Labour when parliament, and the entire country, was infatuated with its tooth-some superstar.
Some of Mullin’s recollections have already acquired the status of classics. The late Tony Banks confided to him that no one ever saw Peter Mandelson enter a room. ‘There’s just a chill in the air, and suddenly, he’s there.’
When she first arrived in Downing Street Cherie Blair liked to muse on her husband’s future. ‘I married an idealist. When Tony leaves office he’s going to teach in Africa.’ Clare Short’s name will for ever be associated with the moment when her pager beeped during an audience with the Queen. Short compounded her embarrassment by taking the device from her bag and reading the message. ‘Someone important?’ Her Majesty asked.
Mullin, a political innocent, accepted a junior government post but had no idea how to advance his career. After the 2001 election he told the chief whip, Hilary Armstrong, that unless he became minister of state he’d prefer to return to the backbenches. Armstrong struck immediately. Eager to decapitate a troublesome and incorruptible colleague, she told Blair that Mullin had decided to quit. A complete fabrication. But Mullin survived her chicanery because he was motivated by principle rather than ambition and because he represented a strain of Old Labour — dissenting, puritanical, self-sacrificing but practical — that connected directly with the grassroots.
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