Forget Eastleigh, Tatchell vs. Hughes was a real by-election

I got a text message the other day, inviting me to a party. This is a nice thing to happen, and not an everyday event. I have become used to all modern forms of communication bringing nothing but trouble; the more modern they are, the more unpleasant will be the message. If it arrives via Twitter, it will usually be a condensed ball of noisome vomit, perhaps containing within it the vestige of a threat. In a sense, we are all Mary Beard these days. The nastiness rains down upon all of our heads, the nastiness from other people. Never mind.

But this was different; not merely an invitation to some sort of agreeable shindig where other people buy the drinks, and perhaps also festive finger food, but one which carried with it the soft thrill of nostalgia, taking me back to a time when I was young and terribly sure of myself, neither of which is true today. It was an invitation to attend the celebration of the 30th anniversary of the Bermondsey by-election.

Do you remember it? I remember it well. The invitation came from the offices of the winner back then, Simon Hughes, now still the MP for the same constituency and the deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats.

Back in early 1983 I was, as now, a member of the Labour party and absolutely chuffed to bits that my party had selected Peter Tatchell to fight the seat for us. I had some connection with Bermondsey — it’s where my mum was brought up, it was the home of the football club I supported, and I’d lived a mile or two distant for the first eight years of my life. So I was particularly pleased that Labour had eschewed the selection of one of those awful, fat, antediluvian working-class people who, like the resigning MP Bob Mellish, had represented the constituency from time immemorial.