This Once Great Movement Of Ours

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Doug Hoyle (Lord Hoyle) MP for Nelson and Colne 1974(Oct)-79, Warrington 1981-83 and Warrington North 1983-1997 has died. He was ninety four and was the father of Sir Lindsay Hoyle, presently the Speaker of the House of Commons. He was an active and important member of the old ASTMS union in which he was a critical ally of Clive Jenkins. He twice defeated notable politicians to become an MP (David Waddington in October 1974, Roy Jenkins at the 1981 Warrington by-election) and was was one of the core group of Soft Left MPs who abstained on the second ballot of the 1981 Deputy Leadership contest, which allowed for Healey to narrowly ward off Benn's challenge. He chaired the PLP during the 1992-97 Parliament and was a government whip in the Lords during the first few years of the Blair government.

Excellently (and we've not had a high-profile incidence of this for years) there's some uncertainty as to his true age. Initial reports said ninety four, but most obituaries are now saying ninety eight. Most yearbooks and so on had always listed his year of birth as 1930, but apparently he was actually born in 1926.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Anyway, do we know how many of the rest of the Thirty Seven are still alive? There's obviously Kinnock himself, of course.

[CumbrianLefty]

Well an actual list of the 37 might help there......

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Well an actual list of the 37 might help there......

This was my subtle (hah) way of asking whether anyone had one haha.

[TheTide]

This seems like as good a thread as any to post this. At 5:18, Peter Mandelson tells the story of how he was once bouncing up and down on Elton John's bed with Thomas the Tank Engine videos (with the Ringo Starr narration) on the television. Just what everyone wants in their head at teatime no doubt.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Well an actual list of the 37 might help there......

This was my subtle (hah) way of asking whether anyone had one haha.

Don't have a list but Jeff Rooker is still alive.

[Blair]

Was this the occasion where Margaret Beckett called Kinnock judas?

[TheTide]

Well an actual list of the 37 might help there......

This was my subtle (hah) way of asking whether anyone had one haha.

Don't have a list but Jeff Rooker is still alive.

Could probably figure out the list via a process of elimination to some extent. Anyone with a reasonable knowledge of the parliamentary party of that time should be able to place most of the Bennites and the vast bulk of the Right.

[CumbrianLefty]

Was this the occasion where Margaret Beckett called Kinnock judas?

She most certainly did. Her political "evolution" just a decade on from that was quite amusing.

[Blair]

Am interesting exclusive in the Times that Harold Wilson was having an affair at Downing Street- but not with Lady Forkbender!

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Ah, but the source is Joe Haines, thus caveat emptor.

[TheTide]

Presumably a woman, otherwise we would have had two non-heterosexual Prime Ministers in a row and three non-heterosexual major party leaders in the 1970 and the two 1974 general elections.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Question is: which prime minister would it be most shocking if it was revealed they had an affair? We know Truss, Boris, Blair, Major, Wilson, Eden, Churchill, Asquith and Lloyd George all at least have rumours of it. Macmillan stayed faithful but his wife had an affair.

[Conservatopia]

Question is: which prime minister would it be most shocking if it was revealed they had an affair? We know Truss, Boris, Blair, Major, Wilson, Eden, Churchill, Asquith and Lloyd George all at least have rumours of it. Macmillan stayed faithful but his wife had an affair.

If it turned out Theresa May had an affair I would get whiplash from the surprise.

Then again people probably thought that about Major too.

[Torrain]

Was going to say Sunak, who’s geeky persona, social clumsiness, as well as a clear affection for his wife all makes it hard to see him conducting an affair.

But then I realised that, as in the preceding post, I’d just described John Major to a tee, and became slightly less certain.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Googling it seems like Ramsay MacDonald also cheated.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Question is: which prime minister would it be most shocking if it was revealed they had an affair? We know Truss, Boris, Blair, Major, Wilson, Eden, Churchill, Asquith and Lloyd George all at least have rumours of it. Macmillan stayed faithful but his wife had an affair.

Macmillan insisted in certain circles that, actually, he himself had a mistress in what always feels like a thoroughly unsuccessful attempt to balance the books (i.e. it isn't that his wife 'had an affair': she was Robert Boothby's* mistress from 1929 until she died in 1966...) even if it were true.

_{*Yes, that one.}

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Googling it seems like Ramsay MacDonald also cheated.

No, his wife died in her early forties in 1911 and his spent the rest of his life as an unattached Ladies Man (often in an unusually literal sense) rather than remarrying.

[Blair]

Didn’t Foot have an affair? He seemed very unlikely to but equally he was a former journalist and

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Didn’t Foot have an affair? He seemed very unlikely to but equally he was a former journalist and

Yes. His wife got suspicious after she spotted him attempting to comb his hair and experiment with cologne.

[CumbrianLefty]

Does this news mean that Forkbender might, in reality, have been JHW's equivalent of Clare Latimer?

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Then again people probably thought that about Major too.

The idea seemed so absurd for someone so grey that Spitting Image made a running joke of it at the time. Unfortunately they picked Virginia Bottomley, must’ve been kicking themselves when the Currie story came out.

[Battista Minola 1616]

Isn't the obvious choice for "most shocking if he had an affair" Gordon Brown?

[MayorCarcetti]

Isn't the obvious choice for "most shocking if he had an affair" Gordon Brown?

Brown was a bachelor until his late 40s and counts the current head of the Romanian royal family, Princess Margareta among his ex's. That said, he seems to have been a devout husband to Sarah so I would be shocked if he had an affair, but it's not like he's had a dull love life.

Thatcher surely would be the most shocking. She was Denis's second wife, but met him after his divorce (when his wife left him for another man) and I can't imagine (and don't want to imagine!) her cheating on him.

[Torrain]

Cameron and Brown’s marriages managed to survive the incredible strain of the serious illness of their respective children. I’d be very surprised if there were interruptions to either relationship, and feel a little uncomfortable speculating beyond that.