A regional daily’s video of a prominent MP singing a song from Grease at a local pub has become the talk of Westminster.

The Leicester Mercury published a video of Keith Vaz, the MP for Leicester East, as he took part in a karaoke performance, singing “You’re The One That I Want” at the celebrations to mark the 75th birthday of a former councillor.

Reporter Peter Warzynski videoed the karaoke performance on his mobile phone on Friday night and loaded it on to the paper’s website, resulting in a number of MPs tweeting the link to it.

The video proved such a hit that BBC’s Sunday Politics team asked to use it on the show, and it was duly shown with presenter Andrew Neil telling viewers that it was a “corker”.

Mr Vaz, who is chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, performed the Grease song made famous by John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John with city councillor Barbara Potter, both pictured below.

The Mercury was invited along to the birthday celebrations to witness the musical tribute and it was also attended by around 200 other guests.

The paper also published a page three story in Saturday’s edition telling its readers about the clip.

Mercury editor Richard Bettsworth said: “It was an incredibly brave thing for Keith and Barbara to do and very entertaining. It has brought a smile to people’s faces and they deserve great credit.”

The video can be viewed on the Mercury’s website here.