I went for a cup of tea with Brooks Newmark, MP for Braintree, and Adam Afriyie, MP Windsor, between votes yesterday; each vote lasts eight minutes, so if you make sure you are first in the lobby for the vote and then run into the tea room you can just get served, grab a cup of tea and then walk last into the lobby for the second vote – this gives you 14 minutes if you run. However, it can be a risky strategy, because they lock the doors of the lobby whether or not you are in the middle of them and they don’t care if you are trapped, so timing is essential.

Brookes, Adam and I deployed this tactic today – it’s a riot in here - you never know what we are going to get up to next!

Whilst gulping his tea, Adam said that women live longer than men because they have more to say and need to get it all out before they die; Given what Brooks said on Monday - are they winding me up?

Whilst I was waiting in the queue for the tea, Stephen Pound, Labour MP for Ealing North, said something absolutely outrageous to Tony McNulty, a fellow Labour MP and Home Office Minister. It was so shocking that everyone was stunned into silence – I broke the tension by saying “I’m going to put that on my blog!” Stephen replied, in a very loud voice, “don’t you dare Miss!”

OK Stephen, I won’t – in the tea room, Chatham House rules apply, but gosh, I wish Chatham House didn’t exist because it was so juicy!!