Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

A couple of interesting Parliamentary tales emerged from recording the two latest editions of Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Parliament's BOOKtalk.

Shirley Williams's memoirs, Climbing the Bookshelves, give a glimpse into a Westminster where women MPs were a rare and suspect species. And several of them fell victim to a phantom bottom-pincher during votes in the crowded division lobbies. After a while, the women decided on revenge and resolved to don their most pointed stiletto heels, and stamp on the assailant.

And sure enough, the next day, a red-faced senior backbencher had to brave their sniggers as he limped into the Tea Room, complaining loudly about a sudden attack of gout.

And there were some startling Parliamentary stories in Christopher Andrew's Defending the Realm: The Authorised History of MI5.

But this was the one that astonished me... In 1961, the then Labour leader Hugh Gaitskell dispatched his close ally and future Foreign Secretary (only for a few weeks, but that's another story) Patrick Gordon Walker to meet senior officials at MI5. He handed them a list of "lost sheep" - Labour MPs suspected of being secret Communists...and MI5 basically shrugged and did nothing.

Some of the names were members of the awkward squad, some turned out to be actual agents for Soviet (and Czech) intelligence. But, as Mr Andrew tells it, our spies couldn't get all that excited about the idea of Moscow Centre being fed trivial nuggets of gossip about who was dissing who on obscure internal Labour committees. How refreshing.

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