I don't normally make it through to Richard Kay's society column in the Daily Mail, but I did today and I learnt something new: John Prescott won't take a seat in the House of Lords.
Why is that interesting? Only because it was widely assumed that he would take a peerage.
As anyone who dealt with him during his 10-year stint as deputy PM will tell you, Prescott always had a very acute sense of status, bordering on obsession. And (although I haven't got a copy to hand, so I can't check the exact quote), in his autobiography Prezza he certainly did not rule out elevation to the upper house.
But now he has. This is what he told Kay, or at least one of Kay's minions:
I don't want to be a member of the House of Lords. I will not accept it. My wife Pauline would quite like me to accept it, but why should I be sidelined to the Lords when I could do so much more for the Labour movement?
"Being a lord is not for three years or four years, it is for life. There are other things I want to get involved in. People think already that I have retired from public life - I haven't. I am still an MP and after that I still want to make a contribution.
Good.
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