For all that the papers would say I was a liar, I took the words I was saying at briefings as seriously as Tony Blair took what he would say at the Despatch Box. I find it very difficult not to tell the truth. I felt I was accountable for what I said.

My aunty says I'm the double of my father. He was a workaholic, which I've definitely inherited. And like me, he could be the life and soul of the party, but also quite withdrawn.

Sometimes Jonathan [Powell] and myself would go to Tony [Blair] and ask him if he was absolutely sure about this or that. That was our job. But ultimately it was his decision.

Friends have suggested that I am the least qualified person to talk about happiness, because I am often down, and sometimes profoundly depressed. But I think that's where my qualification comes from. Because to know happiness, it helps to know unhappiness.

I'm certainly driven, I hate losing, I can be ruthless and short-tempered and terribly competitive.

The media are obsessed with spin doctors and with portraying them as a bad thing, yet seem addicted to our medicine.

Greg Dyke is on record as saying that once the BBC was attacked, it was their job to defend themselves. But that is not their job.