Dennis Skinner: ‘I’ve never done any cross-party stuff. I can’t even contemplate it’

Firebrand MP Dennis Skinner has held Bolsover for Labour for 47 years. Now the subject of an revealing documentary, he talks Corbyn, coalmining and an unlikely Billy Elliot momentI tried to interview Dennis Skinner once before. Twenty-odd years ago, when he was near retirement age and I was starting out at the Observer, I phoned his office at the House of Commons to see if we could arrange something. I was expecting a switchboard or a secretary but the man himself answered the phone. I explained