Conservative minister Ed Vaizey boasted his party would “screw over the liberals” during the coalition negotiations, according to Peter Hain.

Labour’s shadow secretary of state for Wales discloses Vaizey’s remarks in his new biography, Outside In.

“On the Sunday [during the coalition negotiations], watching my team Chelsea win the Premiership, I bumped into the Tory Shadow Minister Ed Vaizey, also a Chelsea fan, and there was a bit of banter between us. ‘We are going to screw over the Liberals,’ he said cockily,“ Hain writes.

In an interview with the Huffington Post Hain was adamant Vaizey made the boasts: “It didn't surprise me, I thought, I didn't think anything else was likely."

Hain says he believed Vaizey, now a minister at the Culture Media and Sport department, had made good on the comments, adding “well, they all have”.

The MP for Neath also claims unions will lose political influence if they disaffiliate with the Labour party, saying shadow chancellor Ed Balls’ warning an incoming Labour government would keep the coalition’s cuts is “just common sense”.

He said when the “hard-left” fire brigades union and the RMT disaffiliated from the party they “lost their influence.”

“They may have influence industrially because they are in particularly sensitive strategic areas of policy but they don’t have any influence politically because they’ve put themselves on the margins, outside the Labour party.

“I don’t know if I need to give them a warning. It’s a statement of fact. If there were any moves to disaffiliation than with that disaffiliation they’d lose their voice. And it would be a mistake.”

And he rails against the “unfair treatment” the media give Ed Miliband, telling Huff Post UK: “When have Labour leaders got good treatment by the media except for the Tories, as they were when Tony was elected, are completely down the pan? That’s the truth. That’s when Labour leaders win the support of the Sun and papers like that. They’ve just reverted to type, frankly.”