TELEVISION star Tony Robinson last night took time out from archaeological digs and filming to speak about his life as a Labour Party activist.

The actor and presenter of the popular Channel 4 programme Time Team was special guest of Darlington Labour Party at an event staged at Darlington College of Technology.

Robinson, who played Baldrick in the hit BBC comedy Blackadder, was invited to speak by his friend, Darlington MP Alan Milburn.

He is in the North-East filming on a dig at a Roman fort at South Shields.

Speaking to an audience of about 60, he said: "It has been the first day of digging and we found absolutely nothing, only sand. One of the team thought he had found something - it turned out to be a concrete vehicle inspection pit."

A member of Labour's National Executive committee, he spoke of his work with the party and of his vision for the future.

"Our biggest achievement is that we have transformed political thinking in this country," he said.

"We are a society, we are about looking after the elderly and the very young, which is all remarkable as we used to be so far away from this.

"We are very good at talking modernisation, but the last thing we think to modernise is our own behaviour. We have a responsibility to make our party and our Government better and better and we can do that together - we can move mountains."

He spoke for more than 90 minutes taking questions from an audience including Darlington College media students.