What are the chances......?

Going now, on eBay, several signed copies of the above Welsh Assembly first day cover signed by Lord Kinnock, not in previous incarnations known as a great campaigner for the institution.

Next week on eBay a Queen's Golden Jubilee cover signed by Paul Flynn MP, a copy of Chris Mullin's diaries signed by Cheryl Gillan, and two DVDs signed by the Home Secretary....

Cheryl has them rolling their eyes

Chris Mullin has reportedly spent some of the time since his diaries were published penning apologies to colleagues he criticised in A View from the Foothills.

No word yet on whether Cheryl Gillan should check her pigeonhole. Mullin is brutal in his assessment of the Shadow Welsh Secretary in her previous role shadowing him at International Development during the passage of a Bill in March 2001.

He writes: "The other piece of good fortune is Cheryl Gillan. Definitely not the A Team. She threw away the first half-hour with another diatribe against the iniquity of the timetable.

"She then tested the patience of the committee with a speech lasting the best part of an hour on the first group of amendments, several times having to be called to order by the chair.

"Once or twice I caught Tories on the benches behind her rolling their eyes; several times the Tory whip, Keith Simpson, winked at me.

"At one particularly low point, she succeeded in talking every one of her colleagues out of the room."

Ms Gillan says she doesn't wish to comment on the book.

Sir Emyr does stand-up

Here's a joke Sir Emyr Jones Parry won't be telling at gatherings of the All-Wales Convention, as re-told by Chris Mullin in his diaries.

"At breakfast Sir Emyr tells a joke about an American general, seconded to Sandhurst who asks of a passing lieutenant, 'Officer, can you tell me where the lecture theatre is at?'

The lieutenant dully tells him, adding pedantically, 'In Britain, sir, we don't put the preposition at the end of the sentence.'

'I get you, lieutenant,' replies the general. 'You mean I should have asked, 'Where is the lecture theatre at, arsehole?'"

Sir Emyr, in his previous role at the UN comes out of the diaries well. Mullin describes him and his wife Lynn: "as agreeable and down to earth a couple as one could hope to find in Her Majesty's diplomatic service," a service in which Mullin believes the toffs have been superseded by bright grammar school boys.

Not everyone in Welsh politics emerges from the hugely enjoyable A View From The Foothills (Profile Books, £20) with their reputations intact. In the absence of politicians from Westminster, I'll be dipping into the book during the next few days.