Back at the turn of the century, Peter Mandelson was a government minister and I was editor of The Independent. I wouldn’t say we were friends, but our paths crossed quite regularly in the course of our labours and we were certainly on amicable terms.

And thus it came to pass that Mandelson came to my wedding party in 2000. The party was at the Groucho Club in Soho and obviously there was no better, more high-profile event that night which demanded Mandelson’s attendance. So he rang me up to ask, not entirely seriously (I assumed), why he hadn’t been invited.

I said he would be welcome if he was at a loose end, and so, as I finished my speech that night, I looked around and there he was in the half-light, sipping a glass of champagne with a security detail in close attendance: Peter Mandelson, AKA The Prince of Darkness.

His attendance at my wedding meant very little to him. It didn’t forge a bond between us. It wasn’t a piece of shared history over which we could reminisce. To Mandelson, then Northern Ireland secretary, the occasion had little more significance than a cocktail party to launch a policy........

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