An unexpected MP: confessions of a political gossip

Some people enter politics because they want to make the world a better place.

Then there are those with welldeserved inferiority complexes who want status, power and position.

Few believe me, but I entered the House of Commons purely by accident.

High virtue in high office? Not a chance, says Jerry Hayes. No staid autobiography or dry political memoir, An Unexpected MP takes you on a raucous and salacious romp through Westminster, the media and public life.

In this no-holds-barred expos, Jerry Hayes shows exactly why people were so surprised when he became an MP from the duty policeman who told him to bugger off when he rolled up on his first day, to the Iron Lady herself, who looked with a steely eye on his cheerful chutzpah. And, as the perfect antidote to the holier-than-thou, whiter-than-white ways of the current crop of politicos, the shameless and shamelessly entertaining Hayes makes a brilliant tour guide to the strange country that is Parliament, taking gleeful swipes at left and right alike.

Full of tall tales of unspeakable debauchery on a tsunami of alcohol, An Unexpected MP is a thundering account of the offbeat lunacy of Westminster and Fleet Street.