We all know Edwina Currie as a shrill, tasteless, attention-seeking Thatcherite nuisance from Liverpool. But the private Edwina — as revealed in her Diaries: Volume II, 1992-97 (Biteback, £20) — is thoughtful, engaging, witty, kind-hearted and, politically, very astute. Has anyone framed a neater analysis of John Major’s idiotic ‘Back to Basics’ drive than this? ‘It outlawed the one protective factor the Tory party has always relied on — hypocrisy.’
She watches senior colleagues plotting to replace him during the mid-1990s, and she sums them up with lethal...
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