Tony Benn (1925-2014)

[Flosshilde]

It's always such a shock when somebody of his stature dies - they seem to have been there for ever, & then suddenly not.

[Nick Armstrong]

RIP. They really don't make them like him any more. I agreed with his ideas more than I cared to admit.

Civilised, charming, a class act. Searing intellect, disarmingly accurate political analysis. A huge loss.

I feel more or less the same save that the charm was cut with a sense of - not sure of the right word... - arrogance / self-satisfaction / smugness, sometimes that I found off-putting. However I've never forgotten going to hear him speak / debate when I was at University - I was just behind him, and was amazed at his technique - a handful of multicoloured felt pens with which he made notes whilst others were speaking, and which enable him to respond more cogently, following a logic / sequence he'd mapped out with his colour-coding.

[johnb]

It is always very sad when someone dies but he had a good life.

I've never bought the image of Tony Benn as this cuddly, wise, grandfather figure. My impression is that, in his heyday, he was extremely ambitious and didn't give a jot about whose toes he stamped on to achieve what he wanted.

He and the clique around him almost destroyed the Labour Party.

[Edit] When John Cole recently died I recall one of the political commentators on the BBC saying that he (John Cole) thought that Benn and Blair were "bad uns". Seems about right to me.

[James Wonnacott]

I disagreed with just about everything he stood for. But I admired him because he believed in what he stood for. They don't make politicians that way any more.

[Honoured Guest]

He was a practical feminist and advocate of gender equality, giving his son a girl's name.

[ahinton]

It is always very sad when someone dies but he had a good life.

I've never bought the image of Tony Benn as this cuddly, wise, grandfather figure. My impression is that, in his heyday, he was extremely ambitious and didn't give a jot about whose toes he stamped on to achieve what he wanted.

He and the clique around him almost destroyed the Labour Party.

That's far too simplistic an assessment, if you'll pardon my saying so - indeed, a misleading one. Tony Benn certainly upset the Labout Party on more than one occasion because he was determined to stick to his socialist guns (if you'll pardon an inappropriate metaphor in the context of a committed pacifist) and, had his party gone with him on this, there would have been a reasonably united and clearly defined opposition in Britain - something that the coutry has not had now for quite some years. During Margaret Thatcher's term as Prime Minister, she was once asked if she wanted to pull the Conservative party to the right and she answered that she wanted to pull all parties to the right; whether in fact she could reasonably be accorded credit for that having subsequently come about is open to question, but the worst aspect of the fact that it has indeed come about and remains the case today is that Britain no longer has an credible and definable "opposition" per se - something which Tony Benn would rightly have deplored, not least on the grounds of his brilliance and wisdom (not yet credited in this thread) as a constitutional historian.

[Boilk]

Was fearing this news of late as had noticed how TB had gone 'off the radar' around 2012.

"Statesman" is not a word I would readily apply to any British politician of the last 30 years, with the exception of Tony Benn: a decent, devoted public servant (both during and after office) who actually - and proactively - lived by the principles he espoused. As Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, has said: “In an age of spin, he was solid, a signpost and not a weathervane.”

He simply towered above his ‘peers’ (for want of a better word).

[Boilk]

He and the clique around him almost destroyed the Labour Party.

I think history might show that Mandelson and Blair destroyed the Labour party by turning it into Tory-Lite, because they cared more about getting elected than upholding the ideological values of the political party they signed up to. Benn was quite vocal about Labour's retreat from the Left, which of course begun under Kinnock.

[Bryn]

I think history might show that Mandelson and Blair destroyed the Labour party by turning it into Tory-Lite, because they cared more about getting elected than upholding the ideological values of the political party they signed up to. Benn was quite vocal about Labour's retreat from the Left, which of course begun under Kinnock.

Oh I think it started well before Kinnockio, but otherwise spot on.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

I think history might show that Mandelson and Blair destroyed the Labour party by turning it into Tory-Lite, because they cared more about getting elected than upholding the ideological values of the political party they signed up to. Benn was quite vocal about Labour's retreat from the Left, which of course begun under Kinnock.

Labour did not retreat, the electorate of members and unions voted for Kinnock and John Smith .... the miseries of Michael Foot's leadership, the militant tendency and the sheer lack of popular appeal of the hard left in the 70s quite possibly had something to do with their voting a centrist [in Labour terms] leadership

Benn was quite capable of a mischievous, if not malign, influence in those days, indeed his popular appeal was never as strong as when he had no opportunity of power .... he was a great speaker and debater, and a brilliant analyst .... but no one seemed to want him as leader ....

[eighthobstruction]

Good on you Tony....nicely done mate....

[Beef Oven!]

It is always very sad when someone dies but he had a good life.

I've never bought the image of Tony Benn as this cuddly, wise, grandfather figure. My impression is that, in his heyday, he was extremely ambitious and didn't give a jot about whose toes he stamped on to achieve what he wanted.

He and the clique around him almost destroyed the Labour Party.



[Edit] When John Cole recently died I recall one of the political commentators on the BBC saying that he (John Cole) thought that Benn and Blair were "bad uns". Seems about right to me.

I guess most of us in here would have known him before he was of 'grandad age' and never bought the stereotype.

In any walk of life, to get to the top, you have to be focused and a tad ruthless at times.

One thing is for sure, when he was brought into the cabinet, he was less fun. Tents and comfort breaks spring to mind!

[Bryn]

... the militant tendency ...

Locally (where I reside) the Militant Tendancy clique effectively teamed up with the Blairites to oust the traditional socialists from the Labour Party.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I was able to have a brief chat with Tony Benn during the Chesterfield byelection, soon after boundary changes had resulted in TB losing his Bristol seat.
He had considerable charm, but he was capable of a little spin himself now and then. For a few brief minutes he was telling a group of animal lovers he was a vegetarian. Later he was seen on television as "one of the people", eating fish and chips.

In the nearby Bolsover constituency was the most principled of them all - Dennis Skinner.

[jean]

Locally (where I reside) the Militant Tendancy clique effectively teamed up with the Blairites to oust the traditional socialists from the Labour Party.

I don't know where you live, Bryn, but the interesting word there is effectively.

Where I live, the Militants handed Kinnock an excuse to expel them from the party, having already previously ousted the traditional socialists (whoever they were) from the local party.