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Monday 9 November 2009

Tebbit's table talk

He's not my kind of politico, but Norman Tebbit comes across pretty well as the FT's latest lunch date. A glimpse of the human being behind the "Spitting Image" persona:

After the 1984 IRA Brighton bomb that injured him and left his wife permanently disabled, cooking and eating together remained one of the few pleasures the Tebbits could still share and enjoy. “Food and drink are very precious to us. In our marriage, there are two very different parts of our life,” he says, evenly and quietly. “We have been married for 53 years and for 25 of them, Margaret has been disabled. It is a bit of a sod. So we are trying to make what we can of it.”

Lady Tebbit can “just about” hold a glass of champagne or a cup of tea but that is the extent of her free movement. For a quarter of a century she has needed the support of two carers around the clock and the devotion of her husband even more. In this, he has never wavered. He even wakes up twice every night, to turn her over to avoid bed sores.

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