WHEN left-wing MP Tony Benn finally left Parliament after more than 50 years he famously announced that he was quitting the House of Commons to spend more time with politics.

He could hardly have guessed how true these words, suggested by his late wife, were going to prove.

Yet after half-a-century as one of Britain's longest-serving MPs, this veteran campaigner on issues that have ranged from the fight against apartheid to support for the miners and abolition of the House of Lords, is still enjoying the kind of cut and thrust that grass roots politics is all about.

Only this time round it is as a star of the live stage. Long rated as one of politics' most popular public speakers, Benn - who served in the Labour Governments of 1964-70 and 1974-79 and forged a reputation as a formidable political diarist - has hit the road.

His An Audience With... shows are playing to sell-out audiences in theatres the length and breadth of the country, even in the most true blue of Tory constituencies.

Bournemouth - which hosts his roadshow at the Pavilion Theatre tomorrow night - boasts a brace of Conservative MPs, but is already well used to hearing the oratory prowess of Tony Benn, a veteran of countless party conferences in the town.

His first visit, he tells me, was way back in 1955 when the BBC asked him to cover all three party conferences. While Benn provided the left-wing viewpoint, his old adversary Enoch Powell was there to speak for the right.

It's hard to imagine two politicians more likely to start trading verbal punches, but Benn says: "I think we have to learn to have serious disagreements without turning it into personal abuse.

"That's what's wrong with political coverage these days. It's all image, abuse and gossip, and frankly I think that switches people off."

What people are really worried about, he says, are issues like the prospect of war with Iraq, the state of their pensions and why, when their children go to college and university, they end up with a huge debt.

"These are the things that interest people in politics, but they need to be discussed in a different way, which is why it is good to be able to go round doing these meetings.

"It certainly gives me a chance to listen and learn - and I do learn a lot from them."

Benn says he has been amazed to discover that he doesn't miss the chamber of the House of Commons very much at all.

"I have absolutely no desire to ever go back and ask the Prime Minister a question ever again. But what I do miss is my constituency and discussing problems with people. If you discuss the problems with people you learn from it."

The huge numbers of people who turn up to his meetings have, he says, confirmed two things in his own mind. "That people feel managed and not represented, and they want to have an opportunity to contribute and not just listen.

"If you watch the leader making a speech on the telly you know that he probably didn't write it himself, that it probably isn't addressed to you at all, but designed to boost our confidence in Wall Street or whatever. And, of course, you can't answer back."

Historically, says Benn, before the days of radio and TV, public meetings were the platform of the people.

"The biggest one I ever did in my life was in Bombay when Nehru was the Indian Prime Minster and there were 400,000 people present. They said to me afterwards they were sorry it wasn't a very big meeting, but it wasn't a public holiday!"

Tony Benn, 77, father of four and grandfather of 10, admits that he has not always been hugely popular for his views. But he believes that if you are honest and stand by your principles there's a better than average chance that you'll win through in the end.

"I've made a lot of speeches that have not won support, even from my own party.

"When I used to meet Gerry Adams to try and get peace talks going I was threatened at one stage with expulsion from the Labour Party. Now I can't get to see him because he's so busy at Number 10.

"Years ago I put down the first motion in the House of Commons to boycott South Africa because of apartheid. And when Nelson Mandela was put in prison I spoke in Trafalgar Square and was suitably denounced as a supporter of terrorism.

"Sometimes you just have to stick at things."

An Audience With Tony Benn is at the Pavilion Theatre in Bournemouth tomorrow night (Sunday September 22). Telephone 01202 456456 for bookings and further information.