LAST week’s piece on the passing of Tony Benn noted that he was an assiduous diary keeper. One entry concerned a visit to the home of Sunderland North MP Chris Mullin when Benn hung up his jacket, but forgot to check that his semipermanent pipe was properly out before putting it in the pocket.

The resourceful Mullin extinguished the subsequent blaze with a bucket of water.

Another entry, recalled by David Walsh, concerned Benn’s tenure as Postmaster General – a role in which he always claimed to have been the first person in Britain to have a telephone answering machine.

It was 1964 and Labour, under Harold Wilson, had just ended 13 years of Tory rule with a majority that, effectively, was two. Among the new backbenchers was West Hartlepool member Ted Leadbitter, clearly out to make a name for himself.

A constituent had complained to the zealous new MP about a telegraph pole put up outside his house. Leadbitter not only demanded its removal, but told the PMG that, unless it went, he would neither attend the House nor take the Labour whip.

Benn referred the matter to the Chief Whip who – it is recorded – advised the newcomer of the error of his ways in “fairly earthy and graphic terms.”

The telegraph pole survived; so did Harold Wilson’s government.