Muck-raking press hammer biologically-white Jowell

The under-fire culture secretary Tessa Jowell, staunchest and prettiest of all Mr Blair's cabinet allies, faced down a barrage of criticism last week over a £400,000 mortgage she took out with her husband David Mills on their London home in September 2000 to invest in an "unmissable" hedge fund opportunity, repaid in full a month later with a "gift" from an unknown benefactor.

In a supremely assured series of interviews with muck-raking journalists camped outside the Kentish Town residence in question, followed by a private word with Sir Gus O'Donnell, the extremely understanding Cabinet Secretary charged with investigating the matter, the spunky minister for sport and TV not only laid to rest all the allegations against her but gave us a timely reminder that the New Labour project in which she is so intimately involved, far from running out of steam, is alive and well and doing great business in some of the swankiest financial hot spots of the world. From Rome to New York via Guernsey and Geneva, from Dubai to the Bahamas via Downing Street, Sardinia and Shanghai a decent slice of the most lucrative corporate deals in politics almost invariably passes through 28 Crediton Road NW5, the formerly obscure terraced house in a popular residential district of inner London that Mr Mills has built up over fifteen years into a bustling international clearing house for punts, hedges, options, bungs, sweeteners, backhanders and sundry capital flows of all kinds that form the essential lubricant between the highest levels of government and private enterprise in the frenetic global marketplace of today.

Amid the swirl of rumour and innuendo that laced the front pages of the newspapers and fuelled the political chat shows last week, one publication stood aloof, its noble stance of dignified silence wholly vindicated by Sir Gus O'Donnell's discovery on Thursday March 1, immediately confirmed by the Prime Minister himself, that Ms Jowell had "done nothing wrong". If only the journalists at the centre of the affair had "washed out their ears" before turning up in such a rowdy rabble on her doorstep they would have heard Tessa telling them so time and time again, with all the conviction and gusto of a Mandelson, Byers or Blunkett at the top of his game, and this ridiculous misunderstanding need never have got as far as the Cabinet Secretary, waking him from his afternoon snooze and eating into his cherished long weekend.

That lone bastion of journalistic integrity The Rockall Times can now reveal that this whole affair was yet another of those lurid storms in teacup stirred up by the sleazier sections of the British press baying for a ministerial scalp and fanned by lowly MPs jealous of Tessa's spectacular success at bringing the 2012 Olympic Games to London, a triumph that hinged on getting a certain Mr Silvio Berlusconi to bring the Italians onside at the last minute and scupper the French bid, for which she will be forever loved by the British public.

This time the usual suspects trying to bring her down were in cahoots with Italian prosecutors who have been conducting a remorseless ten-year vendetta against the pioneering tax consultant David Mills regarding services performed for a certain Mr Silvio Berlusconi whom he has "never met". These included a famous court appearance in which Mr Mills "sailed pretty close to the wind", as he revealed in a candid letter to his solicitor, while defending his client against trumped-up charges of corruption. The assured performance of Ms Jowell's flamboyant spouse under intense cross-examination in Rome, in which he "threw the dogs off the scent", delivering expert testimony valued by Mr Berlusconi at £350,000, did wonders for 28 Crediton Road, raising its profile as a "safe" financial hub amongst the international community of "business-savvy" political leaders who thenceforth began beating a path to his door, even last week elbowing their way through the unseemly ruck of dirt-sniffing reporters to grab a dollop of his peerless advice and sign the papers that would transport their sizeable nest-eggs through various "filters and obfuscations" into high-earning offshore accounts.

In the midst of these demanding claims on his time it was only the lofty reputation of The Rockall Times that secured yours truly an exclusive interview with Mr Mills designed to clear the air and set out the true facts of his Italian connection once and for all. I was prepared to be confronted by a razor-sharp legal brain, to be seduced by silky persuasive tones, but the sheer disarming honesty and evident financial acumen of the culture secretary's husband exceeded all my expectations. Indeed there was no option but to cut the interview short, since it took barely ten minutes to complete the paperwork for the best investment decision of my life and establish his unblemished probity beyond all possible doubt. In the words of Mr Mills himself "whoever the unknown Italian benefactor was with initials SB that signed the cheque to pay off our mortgage in such a timely manner it couldn't possibly have been Silvio — the inordinately complex trail of obscure intermediate transactions through a bewildering array of dummy accounts involving 46 of my offshore companies has made absolutely sure of that."

Nevertheless, according to parliamentary nitpickers Ms Jowell herself was in breach of the ministerial code of conduct for failing to declare the gift to her husband that enabled him to pay off the mortgage they had jointly signed. Under the strict rules of the code, Tessa should have notified her permanent secretary, Sue Street, of the gift. Fortunately, as I was gathering up my papers in preparation to leave with my financial future secure, Tessa herself popped her head round the door to see how we were getting on, and I took the opportunity to question her on the apparent breach of protocol.

"But I never knew!" she protested in all innocence. "My financial advisor never informed me as the true nature of our relationship until much later, on our annual holiday to Sardinia in 2004," she said, looking straight at David Mills. "All you ever talked about was money," she admonished him. "Options, derivatives, gilts, hedge funds, insider trading opportunities, emoluments — how was I to know you were my husband — you never let on for a moment! Obviously if you had done I'd have gone straight to Sue and declared every last detail of our joint income."

Sir Gus O'Donnell, whom I interviewed later, agrees: "Tessa fully accepts that Mr Mills should have informed her of the marriage and if he had done so then she should of course have noted their tax-free gift in the register. Then again, by the time she discovered the truth in 2004 the Inland Revenue had already ruled that the earnings had to be taxed, so there was no pressing need for her to declare it to Parliament at all, which she didn't. Any bright, go-ahead New Labour lady who knows which side her bread is buttered would have done exactly the same."

Though fully exonerated from any wrongdoing the culture secretary's explanation has nevertheless met with a sceptical eyebrow or two, even amongst her admiring public. My next door neighbour Mrs Cummings for example finds it "slightly implausible that she knew so little of the marital arrangements in her household. I'd have thought with all the fuss of the ceremony, then sharing a bed for seventeen years and all that she'd have cottoned on a bit earlier."

Ah, but you see, that's just where fixed assumptions about behavioural norms can lead you so badly astray. All the testimony of her friends and Cabinet ministers backs up Tessa's own account.

"David swept her off her feet in an exhilirating merry go-round of tax consultations, investment seminars and financial health-checks," said Charles Clarke at a gathering of intimate associates in the front room at number 28 to celebrate the final ruling. "She'll swear blind that the day she kissed him and signed her name in the registry she thought she was at the Cheltenham and Gloucester, taking out another temporary mortgage on the other place down in Warwickshire."

Tessa herself nods in agreement. "That's right, and not only that but the name — that's what really threw me. Mills — Jowell. Try as I might I couldn't get them to match up. It was an honest mistake." She prods her husband sharply in the ribs. "You!" she chides him. "You might at least have given me a clue."

Apparently the first inkling she ever had that all was not as it seemed was in December 2003, after a typically romantic candlelit dinner for two at their lucrative love nest in Crediton Road. With a twinkle in his eye David cleared away the pile of hedge fund assessments, took a sip of port, lit a cigar and said "You know Tessa, after all these years I was wondering — it's about time I had a go at exercising my conjugal rights, don't you think? Might make a change from all this form-filling. Shall we say half ten in the bedroom? Knickers off ready when I come upstairs?"

For the unworldly culture secretary this was a turning point. Later that night she experienced strange yet not unpleasant sensations between her legs which she somehow instinctively associated with her financial advisor's curious post-prandial remarks. She began putting two and two together, and it was barely nine months later, on their annual holiday in the Med that the last piece of the jigsaw snapped into place. As they sat together on the balcony in the warm night air with gentle waves lapping on the beach while they scanned the bottom line on their glittering futures portfolio she plucked up the courage to pop the question. "David, that time in the C and G with all those people swarming around dressed to the nines and me in my fluffy white dress, the big heavy ledger we signed our names in, that fuss over the ring, the big pile of presents, cutting the cake and all that — did we actually, you know, tie the knot?"

"Tie the knot?"

"Yes — you know, married, hitched, spliced — oh come on David, you know what I mean."

It was crunch time for the celebrated taxation guru, as one of his long-standing business associates, a Mr Blair of Westminster explains: "To be honest David's real interest in Tessa initially was her outstanding virtue as a tax-exempt special savings account. But in the course of time their relationship matured and after five years he converted her to a personal equity plan. But now as he looked into her eyes he could see it was time to draw a line under all that and move on."

"The one thing he never bargained for was that she would work it out for herself," adds Clarke. "She was always so trusting, and in any case she had her plate full with piles of other documents to sign on important matters of sport and TV. But her womanly nouse was too much for him in the end."

"That's right," Blair agrees. "She got there in the end. And after seventeen years of pulling the wool over her eyes David finally did the decent thing and came clean. It says a lot for the man."

It says a lot for the woman too. The honesty, guts and sheer intellectual agility with which the radiant minister for culture has conducted herself during the course of this entire saga presents an inspiring contrast to the bitter sniping of her curmudgeonly detractors. Notwithstanding the sceptical eyebrows of my neighbour Mrs Cummings I have no hesitation on behalf of The Rockall Times and the legions of Tessa fans in giving three cheers for an outstanding Cabinet minister — secure in the knowledge that British culture in all its splendid, exuberant variety is safe and sound in her perfectly formed and exquisitely grasping pair of hands.

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