Quintin Jardine's blog

Just finished The Third Man, the autobiography of Peter Mandelson; to an extent it was a loyalty purchase, as we have the same agent, but I came away liking the man a lot more than when I began it. (Still don’t like Captain Barbossa, though.) I heard of him first in the mid 80s, when he was beginning to make his presence felt in the Labour Party organisation and I was in the process of leaving the Tories. My dear friend Harvey Thomas had him marked down as a man to be watched, so I have done, from that point on. Having had his perspective on Blair and Brown it will be interesting to read theirs on him. He’s done a great deal for his party over the last quarter of a century, and stood by its leaders with a greater loyalty than they showed him, at those times in his career when he could have used it. One thing is certain; he’s too young to fade away. Wherever he pops up next, I’ll still be following Harvey’s advice, and keeping an eye on him.