Cherie Blair in Liverpool talking about George Bush, the Daily Mail and that nightie incident

She was at her warmest speaking about her children, Tony, and her foundation for women in the developing world. She had brought son Leo with her to go to see the Bugs attraction at one of the city's museums.

Sticking up for the war in Iraq with the same resolve as her husband, she showed too that she is certainly no push over. Apparently one of the byproducts of the military operations ordered by Mr Blair is that there are now lots of boys in Sierra Leone and Kosovo called Tony Blair.

That she could have been a successful politician if she had wanted would seem pretty evident. So was there any chance she would throw her hat in the ring of Joe Benton calls it a day in Bootle?
Having spent years married to an MP, who later became leader of the opposition and then Prime Minister, the QC added: "Why on earth I at 55 would want to start again and compete with him.
"On the other hand if one of my kids wanted to be an MP that would be fantastic."

She also revealed how she had debated the rights and wrongs of the death penalty with George W Bush. "Certainly George has a good sense of humour. There were times when I thought I was the only left wing person he would talk to." Many were left to wonder whether that was a freudian slip or whether she was deliberately not counting her husband as left wing.

Perhaps the most revealing part of the Q and A were her repeated references to the Daily Mail. She clearly still feels scared at the way the paper treated her while she lived in Number 10 Downing Street.
"I don't think there is anything the Daily Mail can say about me that they have not already said."

Proving she also has a sense of humour she compared the "nightie incident" - you know the one - with the Scouse fashion of wearing pyjamas to the supermarket. "Basically I was being a Liverpudlian."

She said we all knew the election was going to be in May before adding: "But Gordon would not tell me first, that's for sure."