Tam Dalyell
Template:Short description Template:For Template:Use British English Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox officeholder Sir Thomas Dalyell, 11th Baronet Template:Postnominals (Template:IPAc-en Template:Respell; 9 August 1932 – 26 January 2017), known as Tam Dalyell, was a Scottish politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Linlithgow (formerly West Lothian) from 1962 to 2005. A member of the Labour Party, he was best known for formulating 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 also known for his anti-war views, opposing the Falklands War, the Gulf War, the War in Afghanistan and the Iraq War.
Early life and career
[edit]Dalyell was born in Edinburgh,<ref>Loch, Percy Gordon (1934) The Family Loch, privately printed, p. 202.</ref> and raised in the family home of his mother Eleanor Dalyell, the Binns, near Linlithgow, West Lothian; his father Gordon Loch CIE (1887–1953) was a colonial civil servant and a scion of the Loch family. Highland Clearances facilitator James Loch (1780–1855) was an ancestral uncle. Loch (and his son) took his wife's surname in 1938, and through his mother Dalyell inherited the baronetcy of Dalyell,<ref name="Guardian obituary">Template:Cite news</ref> but he never used the title.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Dalyell was educated at the Edinburgh Academy and Eton College.<ref name="Independent obituary">Template:Cite news</ref> He did his national service with the Royal Scots Greys from 1950 to 1952, as an ordinary trooper, after failing his officer training. He then went to King's College, Cambridge, to study mathematics, but switched to history. He became chairman of the Cambridge University Conservative Association and vice-president of the Cambridge Union Society.<ref name="BBC 13Jan2004">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=autobio/>Template:Rp Cambridge economist Joan Robinson encouraged him to stay for a year after completing his history degree to take an additional degree in economics, which he did and later described as "the hardest work I ever did, much harder than being a PPS".<ref name=Guardian_20020413>Template:Cite web</ref> He then trained as a teacher at Moray House College in Edinburgh and taught at Bo'ness Academy for three years,<ref name="Independent obituary"/> and was Director of Studies on the ship school Dunera from 1961 to 1962.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
In 1969 Dalyell became a columnist for New Scientist magazine,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> contributing Westminster Scene (later Westminster Diary) until his retirement in 2005. This provided "a conduit for researchers to speak to Parliament and vice versa", covering many subjects of public concern including industrial diseases, data protection, chemical weapons and the environment.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Political career
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Having been educated by left-wing economists at Cambridge, Dalyell said that he became a socialist because of the level of unemployment in Scotland.<ref name=Guardian_20020413/> He joined the Labour Party in 1956, following the Suez Crisis.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> After being unsuccessful as a parliamentary candidate for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles in 1959, he became a Member of Parliament in June 1962, when he defeated William Wolfe of the Scottish National Party in a hard-fought by-election for West Lothian.<ref name="Guardian obituary"/> From 1983 onwards, he represented Linlithgow (when the new town of Livingston formed its own constituency) and easily retained the seat. He became Father of the House after the 2001 general election, when Former Prime Minister Edward Heath retired from the House of Commons.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> He was a nominated Member of the European Parliament from 1975 to 1979,<ref name="Guardian obituary"/> and a member of the Labour National Executive from 1986 to 1987 representing the Campaign group.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Dalyell's independent stance in Parliament ensured his isolation from significant committees and jobs. His early career was promising and he became parliamentary private secretary (PPS) to Richard Crossman.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> He annoyed a number of ministers and was heavily censured by the Privileges Committee for a leak about the biological weapons research establishment, Porton Down,<ref name = "BBC">Template:Cite news</ref> to the newspapers (though he said that he thought the draft minutes of the Select Committee on Science and Technology were in the public domain).<ref name=autobio>Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Rp When Labour were defeated in 1970, his chances of senior office were effectively over. He was opposed to Scottish devolution and was the first to come up with the "West Lothian question", although it was actually named by Conservative MP Enoch Powell. He continued to argue his own causes: in 1978–79, he voted against his own government over 100 times, despite a three-line whip.<ref name = "BBC"/>
In the 1990s, Dalyell asked the Lord Advocate, Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, to grant diplomatic immunity to Lester Coleman, a co-author of Trail of the Octopus, so that he could give evidence in the Lockerbie bombing trial in Scotland; the US Government had indictments against Coleman, accusing him of passport fraud and perjury. Allan Stewart, a former Scottish Office minister and Conservative MP for Eastwood, also said that Coleman should be granted immunity so he could testify in Scotland. The Lord Advocate rejected Dalyell's plea, saying that the Home Office and the English courts had jurisdiction over the demand of the US government's extradition demand regarding Coleman, and that the Crown Office and the Scottish Office had no authority over the case.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Dalyell later said, "I had contact with Les Coleman 10 years ago. In my opinion, though he has a chequered history, I take him seriously."<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Dalyell was vocal in his disapproval of actions he deemed imperialistic. Beginning with his opposition to Britain becoming involved in the Indonesia–Malaysia confrontation in 1965, he contested almost every British military intervention, arguing against Britain's involvement in the Aden Emergency,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> the Falklands War (especially the sinking of the General Belgrano), the Gulf War (where he declared Kuwait to be "the 19th bloody state of Iraq"),<ref name="BBC Obituary">Template:Cite news</ref> the Kosovo War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> "I will resist a war with every sinew in my body", he said.<ref name=Guardian_20020413/> Dalyell was also a supporter of the Chagossians in their campaign to return to Diego Garcia after being expelled in 1968.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> When invited by a television journalist to rank Tony Blair among the eight Prime Ministers he had observed as a parliamentarian, he cited Blair's policies in Kosovo and Iraq as reasons for placing his party leader at the bottom of the list. He was also a strong presence in Parliament concerning Libya and led no fewer than 17 adjournment debates on the Lockerbie bombing,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> in which he repeatedly demanded answers by the Government to the reports of Hans Köchler, United Nations observer at the Lockerbie trial.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
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.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Following his outspoken opposition to the 2003 invasion of Iraq and criticism of the Government, Downing Street suggested that he might face withdrawal of the Labour whip.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In May, the American magazine Vanity Fair reported Dalyell indirectly as having said that Prime Minister Tony Blair was unduly influenced by a "cabal of Jewish advisers".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> He specifically named Lord Levy, who was Blair's official representative in the Middle East, and Labour politicians Peter Mandelson (whose father was Jewish) and Jack Straw (whose great-grandfather was Jewish). Mandelson said that "apart from the fact that I am not actually Jewish, I wear my father's parentage with pride".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Dalyell denied accusations that the remarks were anti-Semitic.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In March 2003, regarding the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Dalyell accused Blair of being a war criminal. He stated that "since Mr Blair is going ahead with his support for a US attack without unambiguous UN authorisation, he should be branded as a war criminal and sent to The Hague".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
On 7 March 2003, Dalyell was elected as Rector of the University of Edinburgh.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> After a three-year term, he was succeeded in 2006 by Mark Ballard. It was announced on 13 January 2004 that Dalyell would not seek re-election as an MP at the next general election,<ref name="BBC 13Jan2004"/> and he left the House of Commons in April 2005 after 43 years as a Member of Parliament.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> He had been Scotland's longest-serving MP since the resignation of Bruce Millan in 1988. He was succeeded as Father of the House by Alan Williams. In 2009, The Daily Telegraph reported that Dalyell had submitted an expenses claim for £18,000 for three bookcases just two months before his retirement from the House of Commons.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Dalyell claimed that this was a legitimate expense to which he was entitled;<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> the House of Commons' Fees Office released £7,800.
Dalyell was given an honorary doctorate by Heriot-Watt University in 2011.<ref>Template:Cite press release</ref>
Personal life and death
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Dalyell married Kathleen Wheatley, a teacher, on 26 December 1963;<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> she was the elder daughter of John Wheatley, Lord Advocate and Labour MP for East Edinburgh.<ref name="Independent obituary"/> They have a son Gordon Wheatley Dalyell,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and a daughter Moira, both of whom are lawyers. In his retirement, and for some years previously, he contributed obituaries to The Independent.<ref name="Independent obituary"/> 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."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Dalyell died at the House of the Binns on 26 January 2017, at the age of 84, following a brief, undisclosed illness.<ref name="Independent obituary"/><ref name = Torrance>Template:Cite ODNB</ref>
Arms
[edit]Bibliography
[edit]- The Case of Ship-Schools (1960), Template:OCLC
- Ship-School Dunera (1963), Template:OCLC
- Devolution: The End of Britain? (1977), Template:ISBN
- One Man's Falklands (1982), Template:ISBN
- A Science Policy for Britain (1983), Template:ISBN
- Thatcher's Torpedo (1983), Template:ISBN
- Misrule (1987), Template:ISBN
- Dick Crossman: A Portrait (1989), Template:ISBN
- The Importance of Being Awkward: The Autobiography of Tam Dalyell (2011), Template:ISBN
- The Question of Scotland ~ Devolution and After (2016), Template:ISBN
See also
[edit]References
[edit]External links
[edit]- The Papers of Tam Dalyell at the Churchill Archives Centre
- Template:Hansard-contribs
- Tam Dalyell, former MP Linlithgow on www.theyworkforyou.com
- Westminster Diary: Tam Dalyell Column from New Scientist magazine
- Catalogue of Dalyell's papers, mostly collected while PPS to Richard Crossman, held at the Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick
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