Another Blair aide to write his memoirs

Jonathan Powell, former chief of staff to Tony Blair, is to become the second member of New Labour's inner circle to pen his No 10 memoirs after Alastair Campbell. Powell left Downing Street when Blair went last June and swiftly fell onto the gravy train, becoming managing director of Morgan Stanley's investment banking arm in December.

According to his sister-in-law, socialite Carla Powell, writing in this week's Spectator, he has finished a book on his time in office, focusing on the Good Friday agreement in Northern Ireland that he helped to broker. But anyone expecting salacious details of Downing Street rows will be disappointed.

It won't be a "self-glorifying diary but a straight piece of history," remarks Carla Powell sniffily, noting also that "those who have seen the draft say that it is a first-class read even after Whitehall and the libel lawyers had a go at it."

Powell made up (with Campbell) the triumvirate at the heart of New Labour. While his publishers Bodley Head loudly trumpet Blair's assessment that "a lasting settlement would not have been achieved without the intense involvement of Jonathan Powell", there is a darker side to his achievement.

Powell was a key proponent of the informal 'sofa politics' that led to the 'dodgy dossier' and the outing of Dr David Kelly, and his role was closely scrutinised by the Hutton Inquiry. Powell also emailed Sir John Scarlett demanding that the dossier be toughened up. It may be a few more years before Powell sees fit to put the circumstances of these events to papers.