IT WAS an emotional tribute delivered in a voice heavy with thanks and regret. We expected nothing less from Tony Blair as he bade a political farewell to his pal and New Labour co-creator Peter Mandelson. But did he have to really describe the final hours of Mr Mandelson's Cabinet career as ''tragic''? No, but he didn't have to....but he did. I thought tragedies were things like fatal rail crashes or earthquakes. The personal misfortunes of a surprisingly accident-prone politician are not quite on a par.

ARE Mo Mowlam and Peter Mandelson finally burying the hatchet? Or was Peter just being a good loser on Wednesday afternoon? The two Teesside MPs are reliably reputed to be not exactly the best of friends, not least since Redcar MP Dr Mowlam was shunted out of Northern Ireland to make way for Mr Mandelson. But Peter emerged from the Commons after his final performance as a Cabinet Minister hand-in-hand with....our Mo.

PETER'S resignation statement contained the immortal line about how he simply wanted to ''remove'' himself from the stories and speculation surrounding him. So far, so bad. Since Wednesday, we've learned what he and his partner Reinaldo da Silva had to eat on Thursday - a take-away ''Mermaid Queen'' pizza involving tuna, anchovies, cheese, tomato and capers. And it was reported yesterday that, on Tuesday, as he battled on the airwaves to keep his job, Mr Mandelson left his two dogs Bobby and Jack in his room at the Northern Ireland Office. Result? The pets missed their usual walkies but didn't miss the sofa when they had to spend a penny.

BILLY Hague was on sparkling form at Thursday's Commons Press Gallery lunch. The comic timing of the Yorkshire born-and-bred Tory leader belies the oft-quoted claim that all the best stand-up comedians are Lancastrians (well, I reckon they are but I declare a relevant west-of-the-Pennines bias). But Mr Hague seemed on shaky ground when The Northern Echo lobbed in an gentle question about the single currency. Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn that very morning had dropped a hint the size of a truckload of Micras that the decision to invest in Sunderland would probably not have been taken if an anti-euro government was in power. Mr Hague, MP for Richmond in North Yorkshire, cheerfully batted that away and recalled how when he was Welsh Secretary, lots of Japanese investment came piling into the Principality. Marvellous. But that was before the introduction of the euro on the Continent and the creation of the Grand Canyon of a gulf between the value of the pound and the single currency.

IS ALAN Milburn getting a mite touchy about the abolition of community health councils? I reckon so. The Health Secretary is piloting through legislation ditching the traditional patients' watchdogs and replacing them with a completely new system. The Darlington MP claims the new scrutiny and patient-involvement arrangements are much better. But this week, I hear he lost his rag with Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland MP Ashok Kumar. Now Dr Kumar is New Labour through and through but he does have an irritating habit to the party control-freaks of independently sounding off about the odd matter of principle. So that's why he and Mr Milburn came to verbal blows. I have regular bust-ups with Ashok but I'm told Alan is normally a right old smoothie in his dealings with backbench MPs.

QUOTE of the week. Easington MP John Cummings was addressing a debate on manufacturing in the North and told MPs how the region had suffered an economic ''paralysis'' over the past 35 years. ''Fortunately, the corner has been turned and that paralysis is now on hold,'' he added. John Prescott, eat your heart out!

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