A man of courage and conviction

Whatever you might think about Peter Hain, he has proved himself to be a man of great personal courage and conviction. Of course, when it comes to being a British politician he is not a lot better than any of the others. But at least he has done something.

Where Hain showed his mettle was well before he even lived in Britain, let alone became an MP or a minister. It was as a small boy in South Africa, where he joined forces with his amazingly brave and dedicated parents in their struggle against Apartheid. For this alone, his autobiography, Outside In is a remarkable and sometimes inspiring read. For this alone, his footprint in history will be much larger than that of most of his more illustrious contemporaries.

When I entered Parliament in 1983, the green benches were stuffed with old boys who had fought in the war. Many, if not all of them had been heroic. All were modest. Most left in the 1987 election. And who replaced them but the usual array of time-servers, greasers, chancers and those who had racked up a stack in the city?

Hain was different when he was elected in 1992. As a boy he was running messages for the ANC while his parents were being imprisoned without trial and subject to banning orders. His mother was smuggling messages into prison with invisible ink and concealed in oranges. His parents and friends harboured fugitives and supported Nelson Mandela at his trial.

As a child, he saw a family friend horribly tortured and hanged while supporters sang ‘We Shall Overcome.’ And his first speaking engagement was as as a fifteen-year-old boy reading the address at his executed friend’s funeral. All of this marks him out as a man of courage.

The time came when it was too dangerous for the family to stay and they set sail for England. But he couldn’t forget the wickedness that was being perpetrated in the name of Apartheid in the country of his birth, and decided to organise and agitate in a way that would hit South Africa where it hurt: sport. Well, you know the rest.

But what is fascinating is how the British establishment, sometimes in league with the South African security forces (BOSS), conspired to break him. Show trials, a letter bomb and a staged bank robbery showed how desperately they wanted to bring down Hain the Pain. In the end he won and shamed public opinion into acknowledging the true evil of apartheid.

So you can imagine, when he first entered the Commons as a Labour MP, how his colleagues felt about him. Most of their struggles had been in the back room of a trade union or handing a brief to a shadow minister. Most of them weren’t household names even in their households. And he was a former Liberal. They therefore despised him.

This excellent book charts his rise through the ranks to become the coitus interruptus of the cabinet. He never was quite sure whether he was in or out. But there are some cracking anecdotes. My favourite was when the cabinet decided to have a coffee break before a meeting of the political session:

‘But there was no coffee to be found and we somewhat grudgingly resumed. Then the door burst open and Vera, a number 10 veteran who normally organised tea and coffee, came bursting in. Slightly aggressively she looked around: “What are you all doing in here?” As the room bust out laughing, Tony nonplussed, explained. But she wasn’t having any of it. We never got our coffee; instead she took it a upon herself to lecture us on perceived leniency towards sexual offenders: “We’re all against this, I hope you lot are too.”

‘Tony told how shortly after the 1997 election, he had met senior trade union leaders. Vera was invited to take coffee orders. She looked fiercely around the table as if she rather resented giving them anything pronouncing, “Well, you lot have never done anything for me.”‘

And there are many more like this. But don’t go away thinking Hain is a saint. He knows how to get down and dirty like any other politician and is not afraid to make bitchy remarks about his colleagues. Jack Straw is ‘eccentric and nerdy’. Prescott has ‘distrustful eyes… a chip’. And Robin Cook is ‘not a team player’.

Nor is he afraid to put the boot into an old friend like Rhodri Morgan when needs must, to the cheerful grin of the awful Mandelson who told him that it was ‘character building.’

For anyone vaguely interested in politics this is a serious book and well worth reading. Whatever you think about Hain he is still a serious player. And we should never forget that he was an effective Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

Getting Paisley and Adams together as the Chuckle Brothers was no mean feat, mostly achieved by telling assembly members that their expenses and salaries would stop unless agreement to form a government by a certain date.

Heaven knows what the political future holds for him. By rights he should be leader of the Labour Party. But it will never happen. Despite being the most effective strategist and campaigner that they have, he is still regarded as an outsider.

I’m afraid that I have a guilty pleasure: I have always liked and admired Peter Hain. He is a voice worth listening to – even when you don’t always agree with what he is saying.