Peter Mandelson: I mended fences with John Prescott in final conversation

Lord Peter Mandelson has revealed he and Lord Prescott made peace in their final conversation earlier this year.

The pair did not always see eye-to-eye while serving in Tony Blair’s government, with Lord Prescott once comparing his colleague to a crab he had named “Peter” in 1997.

But following the announcement of his death on Thursday, Lord Mandelson revealed the pair had made up earlier this year over FaceTime.

Speaking to the Sky News Breakfast programme, he said: “I locked horns with him, yes. But a very funny thing happened to me this year. I was at home on a Sunday morning and the phone went and then suddenly I put it on and it was the face of John Prescott on my phone FaceTiming me from Hull.

“I mean, no advanced warning. No how do you do. It was, ‘hello, is that you?’ ‘Yes John, it is me. What do you want?’

“He said, ‘I just want to say that I know it was difficult and we were bloody awful to you at times and I was, but actually you did good and I want to forgive you.’ What am I being forgiven for here? It was just, ‘I want to forgive you because you did good. And I know it wasn’t easy at times and I know it was rough and I know I didn’t help but now I understand.’

“And I said, ‘John, that’s very kind of you. How do you suddenly understand this?’ He said, ‘oh well somebody gave me this book of yours. I didn’t read it before. It looked very boring. But I’ve looked at it, I’ve dipped into it and I’ve seen what you went through … I feel rather sorry for you actually. And anyway, thanks very much.’

“It was a few minutes more … but that was it. That was the last time I spoke to him.”

Lord Prescott was “absolutely impossible” to work with but was “loyal” and “wanted to make it work”, Lord Mandelson added.

He said: “When I say he was sort of courageous, he was. When I say he was loyal, he was. When I say he was determined, he was.

“He was always determined to get his own way on any particular issue at any given moment. Right up until the point he’d say, ‘OK, I’ll do this for you. You do this for me. As long as you cover this off, I’ll happily go along with it.’

“So he was a negotiator. He was a trade union negotiator. He was a broker. But, at the end of the day, he wanted it to work and the way in which he made it work was by being incredibly difficult for days on end and then, finally, sealing it, making work, agreeing it and off we went.”

Lord Prescott, a key figure of the New Labour project, died “peacefully” and surrounded by relatives at his care home, according to his family.