"We still live in an essentially stereotypical way where men earn more than women and women drive men - most men don't know what on earth is going on around them," she says, pouring a tiny pot of camomile tea.

Ah, bless us. Anyway, the point of today's Telegraph interview (in which super-chameleon Kirstie Allsopp is variously described as a person who writes in a Wendy House, lives with pretty things, is more Monica Bellucci than Mary Poppins, is part Care Bear) is that Kirstie is angry about sellers' packs. They're going to cripple an already crippled market, she says. Double cripple it. The (very good) reasons are: there's no cap on costs; there aren't enough surveyors to go round; buyers would choose to have their own surveys anyway; the mortgage companies still haven't agreed to accept sellers' packs; the packs may have a shelf life, and the market can be slow; estate agents may have to take out expensive insurance (passed on to us) if they're held responsible for the accuracy of the packs. They're all good reasons to distrust HIPs, but the best is arguably the failure of mortgage providers to sign up for the scheme. And then... the bombshell:

She did a programme on good and bad post codes, and his beloved Hull came out particularly badly. "His department was on the phone saying he could show me a good time in Hull," she says. "I mean, he should have been running the country, not chasing after some two-bit television presenter.

See? That's Kirstie. Who else could resist a good time in Hull with John Prescott?