TAM DALYELL OBITUARY

RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: february 2017 :: RMTnews 29 R MT member Tam Dalyell was a man of political and social contradictions, an aristocrat that strongly supported trade unionism and a former Tory who became a staunch socialist politician. A former Conservative activist, he became a thorn in the side of successive Tory governments led by Margaret Thatcher whom he described as “a bounder, a liar, a deceiver, a cheat, a crook and a disgrace to the House of Commons”. Yet he won admiration from across the political spectrum as an honourable and principled member of parliament and even had many Tory friends including Ken Clarke. He represented West Lothian from 1962 to 1983, then Linlithgow from 1983 to 2005. He is particularly well known for his formulation of what came to be known as the "West Lothian question", on whether non-English MPs should be able to vote upon English-only matters after political devolution. He was a long-standing member of RMT parliamentary group and described John Prescott's resignation from the group in protest at the union’s left policies as "petulant". He first joined the Labour Party following the disastrous 1956 invasion of Egypt by British, French and Israeli forces which became known as the Suez Crisis. This imperialist aggression – an unsuccessful attempt to gain control of the Suez Canal and remove the Nasser government – made him a committed opponent of future British imperialist interventions for the rest of his life. Beginning with his opposition to action in Borneo in 1965, he opposed the British invasion of Aden, the depopulation of Diego Garcia, the Falklands War and the sinking of the General Belgrano in particular, the illegal attacks on Yugoslavia and the Gulf War. He also fought to uncover the truth about the Lockerbie bombing and consistently said that he did not believe Libyan leader Colonel Gadaffi was responsible for the outrage. When invited to rank Tony Blair among the eight prime ministers he had observed as a parliamentarian, he cited policy over Yugoslavia and Iraq as reasons for placing his party leader at the bottom of the list. In February 2003 he became the first Father of the house to be ordered to leave the chamber, after asking questions about the government's "dossier" on weapons in Iraq. In March 2003, regarding the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Dalyell accused Blair of being a war criminal that should be sent to The Hague. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said that “Tam was a titan of parliamentary scrutiny, fearless in pursuit of the truth. From Iraq to the miners’ strike, he doggedly fought to expose official wrongdoing and cover ups”. Dalyell stood down from the House of Commons in 2005 and in 2011 he published his autobiography, The Importance of Being Awkward. The dedication is "To the men and women of West Lothian – Labour, SNP, Conservative, Liberal, Communist – who, whatever their political opinions, were kind to me in all sorts of ways over 43 years as their representative in the House of Commons”. TAM DALYELL RMT stalwart ANTI-WAR: Tam Dalyell speaking against NATO aggression against Yugoslavia on April 11 1999 LONG SERVICE: Fife branch secretary Jim Phelps presented Tam with his long service award in December. OBITUARY