FEARS of Trotskyite infiltration of the Labour Party reached bizarre new heights yesterday when former PM Tony Blair admitted he was inspired to enter politics after reading Leon Trotsky’s biography.

Mr Blair, who trampled on the Labour Party’s traditional socialist values during his 10 years at the helm, told Peter Hennessy on Radio 4’s Reflections programme that he had been a “Trot” briefly while studying law at Oxford University in the 1970s.

“I literally had no interest in politics,” the former PM said as he explained that the first political book he read was one of Isaac Deutscher’s trilogy on Trotsky.

“ I picked it up and started to read it.

“I suddenly thought the world’s full of these extraordinary causes and injustices and here’s this guy Trotsky who was so inspired by all of this that he went out to create a Russian Revolution and change the world. It was like a light going on.”

However Mr Blair’s “light” was quickly extinguished after he met Cherie Blair, who he described as being a “mainstream Labour person.”