Though had never previously met him, I’ll admit to feeling a little nervous at the prospect of interviewing Peter Mandelson last week for This Morning. Not because the man himself makes me nervous, just his reputation for being so slippery under questioning. I was worried he would avoid giving us anything interesting and merely steer the interview through the obligatory book plugging dance (we’re led to believe he’s also a pretty good dancer).
“I’ve never been on here before” he said as he charmingly introduced himself. “Don’t worry” I replied, “We’ll probably just ask you what colour pants you’re wearing.” The look of mild horror on his face assured me the encounter might be fun. As predicted, he expertly attempted to dodge the rubber bullets, but we scored a couple of original sound bites. It was only at the point where I asked if it was true the Tony Blair was ‘livid’ that we got our direct hit. “If I had my BlackBerry, I would read the text I got from Tony”
“No problem, we have plenty of time, you can have it brought to you”
“Well, er, I would need my glasses too!”
“That’s OK; we can have them brought in as well”
In fairness, Lord Mandelson remained reasonably unflustered, there was a look of uncertainty in his eyes, but mostly they were flickering with mischief. What wasn’t seen on television though, was his obligatory ‘attendant with Filofax’ standing just behind the camera, (every politician has one; some even have two or three). He was obviously in charge of the aforementioned BlackBerry, and as I continually asked him to bring it to its master, it was plain that he was convinced it was about to set fire to his pocket and he was obviously going to die in the ensuing conflagration!
What should he do? Where should he go? Maybe he could just drop in a dead faint and everything would just go away? In the end, and without a word, he turned and fled the studio!
True to his word, in the commercial break, Lord Mandelson showed the text from Mr Blair to our news team as he copied it down onto a post it, for me to read on air.
"TB: I specifically have said to all who have asked that I'm NOT angry!!"(crossed out) No one is authorised to
What that bottom line goes on to say, we’ll probably never know, but The Lord was in full swing and only a firm “No” from Mr Filofax prevented any further disclosure.
As we said goodbye, Peter Mandelson reiterated that his failing eyesight had become an irritation, which was why he couldn’t read a thing without his glasses. I suggested laser therapy, which I had recently and successfully been through - it had cured both my long and short sight. In a moment of rare uncertainty he said “Oh no, what if it goes wrong?”
I assured him that I felt it was perfectly safe and surely he was braver than that! He left with the number of my surgeon. Certainly after I had it done, anything I have written down has been clear enough for me to fully understand the consequences.
Did you see the interview? What did you think - and what do you think the cryptic message could mean?
Click HERE to watch the video now.
