ONE of the region's MPs has poured scorn on claims that she was once Gordon Brown's secret mole - in an eerie parallel to the "Greengate" affair now rocking parliament.

Helen Goodman, the Bishop Auckland MP, was at the centre of a leak inquiry after an explosive report she wrote as a Treasury civil servant was revealed by Mr Brown, then the Shadow Chancellor.

The study rocked John Major's government back in 1996, by suggesting the Conservatives planned to privatise pensions and welfare benefits and force drivers to pay to use roads if they won back power.

Revealing the details on the floor of the Commons, a gleeful Mr Brown described the report as "a nightmare vision of the future under Tory rule".

As the report's author, Ms Goodman naturally fell under suspicion - especially when it emerged she was a Labour party member who had made the shortlist for the Barnsley East seat at the forthcoming general election.

Fast forward to 2008 and the episode has triggered Tory accusations of hypocrisy against the prime minister, following the arrest of Damian Green, the party's immigration spokesman, for receiving leaked Home Office documents.

The police have accused Mr Green of "grooming" his contact at the Home Office, who was a Tory candidate for Sunderland Council and was even interviewed by him for a job.

The crucial difference, however, is that the 1996 inquiry formally cleared the future Bishop Auckland MP of any involvement in the leak and the culprit was never identified.

Ms Goodman, now a government whip, said: "I understand why people are trying to draw a parallel with the Damian Green controversy, but it is simply not there.

"I did not leak the report and, in fact, I never even met or spoke to Gordon Brown until I was elected as an MP in 2005. Furthermore, there were no national security issues, as there are now."

Without the controversy, Ms Goodman would probably not be Bishop Auckland's MP, because it forced her to withdraw her name from the Barnsley East shortlist - a safe seat, that Labour won easily.

Instead, she was forced to wait a further eight years to start her Westminster career, working in the meantime for several charities, including the Children's Society.

There are two further ironies. One is that Ms Goodman and Mr Green were acquaintances at Oxford University, where both read philosophy, politics and economics.

And the second? Several of the ideas in the "nightmare vision" that so embarrassed the Tories are now mainstream Labour policies, including privatising welfare and pay-as-you-drive on motorways.