When you’ve scaled the summit of government, implemented weighty policy decisions and fraternised with world leaders, there can be an understandable temptation to jealously guard your reputation and your political legacy.

If, on the other hand, like Chris Mullin, you’ve been on the lowlier rungs of the ministerial ladder, acting as the “minister for folding deckchairs”, you have less anxiety about such things. This helps to explain why Mullin’s diaries – written from what he calls the “foothills” of power – are such a hugely enjoyable read.

As with the most memorable political diarists – Tory libertine and Thatcher-favourite Alan Clark comes to mind – the author is close enough to power for his account to be of some historical interest, but not so close that he has a reason to be less than candid.

Mullin, a former member of the Socialist Campaign Group on the Labour back benches, gave up a relatively powerful berth as chairman of the home affairs select committee to become a junior minister in John Prescott’s mammoth Department for Environment, Transport and the Regions.

He frets before doing so, worrying that he is sacrificing credibility and hard-won authority. Later, he leaves the job, returning to both the back benches and his committee post. But history repeats itself two years later when, despite his vote against the war in Iraq, Tony Blair lures him back down to the front bench to serve as minister for Africa – by far his happiest experience in government. Throughout all this, we get a nigh-on daily update on events, ranging from high-minded affairs to low-minded (but fun) gossip.

Ironically, it is during his time outside government that Mullin gets closest access to Tony Blair, meeting him weekly as a member of the Labour Party’s consultative parliamentary committee.

He likes Blair – mischievously referred to as ‘The Man’ – and if these diaries are accurate, Blair quite likes him. However, the relationship seems to take a comical turn for the worse when our author finds himself plonked beside Blair during prime minister’s questions. When ‘the man’ turns surreptitiously to ask Mullin for a piece of information, the latter doesn’t even hear him, being too distracted by his ringside seat on the theatre.

Mullin’s background was as a left wing journalist and campaigner, a former editor of Tribune who helped secure the release of the Guildford Four, but he’s surprisingly loyal once actually in government. What’s more, he is notably bereft of cynicism about politics and power – though able to spot it in others. He has a slight tendency to casually assume the moral high ground, which can be irritating for readers and colleagues alike.

Mullin is due to stand down at the next election, and publishing this book might be seen as something of a return to a previous career: he has been a novelist as well as a journalist in the past, authoring the bestseller A Very British Coup. Those skills help him to deliver a snappy, engaging perspective on the Blair years, from scandals through Iraq to Gordon Brown, and an interesting view of the civil service.

In A Very British Coup – a book successfully adapted for television – Mullin imagines a Britain in which a left-wing, working-class Labour prime minister is hounded out of office by right-wing forces in the media and establishment. 

How times change. Mullin’s  diaries provide an insight into the least left-wing, least working-class Labour prime minister in history.

Matt O’Toole