I knew Norman Tebbit for nearly 40 years as a politician, a neighbour and a friend. We lived in the same London street for over 20 years along with another Conservative Member of Parliament, called Michael Heseltine. When I was a Maastricht rebel in the 1992 parliament, which was a very awkward position indeed for a new MP, he was one of the few outstanding figures who lent us real courage.
During our time as neighbours we must have had hundreds of informal conversations about the state of politics and the direction of the Conservative Party. In private Norman was quietly spoken, but guided by his convictions and depth of experience. Which was real, tough and led to principles which he stuck to.
Primarily because of the Brighton bomb, there remain many “what ifs” concerning the political life and destiny of the Chingford polecat. I have no doubt that some of the major political outcomes of the late 1980s and 1990s would have been quite different if Norman had been able to fully exercise his political influence and abilities.
His sense of purpose was made stronger from having not come from a family of the Tory ruling class
Personally Norman was a considerate, gentle man in the true sense of those words. Like Margaret Thatcher he had an unerring sense of the honourable thing that needed to be done, made stronger, I believe, from having not come from a family of the Tory ruling class. Like her, he was punctilious in these matters. Norman neither let you down nor sought to stitch you up. He may have had fun, and been extremely amusing, but for him politics was not a game.
Under Thatcher, Britain embraced long awaited change. Change that Powell had argued for in the 1950s and 1960s and indeed change that Heath as leader of the party had initially sought in office. But saying that was easier than doing it was: it required hard men.
After the 1987 General Election Thatcher lost Norman Tebbit, as he had to put his beloved wife first. Indeed, the Prime Minister had effectively lost him in 1986 when he served as Party Chairman rather than commanding a front line departmental post. Economic policy which had been so effective in the early years of the Thatcher premiership was seriously undermined by the Treasury’s mistaken belief that inflation could be controlled by shadowing the Deutschmark. Whether sincerely convinced of this error, or just because it suited their short-term tactical purposes, the Tory MPs who resented Thatcher’s successes — who hated her for winning — seized their chance.
By 1990 her authority had been so undermined that Europhile cabinet members, led by John Major and Douglas Hurd, were able to bounce the PM into letting Sterling enter the ERM. Within weeks the victor of three General Elections had been removed from office and joined Tebbit on the backbenches. The party’s misery was only to start here, not end.
If Norman Tebbit had remained in the House of Commons after the 1992 General Election the Maastricht Treaty would have been defeated on the floor of the House of Commons or withdrawn by the Conservative government. A fit and able Tebbit, unscared by the Brighton bomb, would have provided the leadership that this country desperately needed at that time.
Monstrously the Brighton bomb effectively removed Norman Tebbit from frontline politics and it was probably, in their evil terms, the greatest achievement of the IRA. Tebbit’s reform of the Trade Unions transformed the economic prospects of this country and may have been the Thatcher government’s most lasting achievement. Certainly it has been the one that even Tory governments have been unable to undo, never mind Labour ones.
Yet Thatcher, lacking Tebbit’s deep convictions and support in cabinet, was ultimately unable to restrain the forces of Tory paternalism. Like Norman, she too was in the Lords after 1992 — ghosts of the chance we could have had to defeat Maastricht too, and get a quarter century head start on Brexit. I can only say, as one of those Maastricht rebels, that we did our best, and only did as well as we did because of their support and inspiration.
In death, as is always reasonable, manners will come to the fore. And thus the Norman of this sad week has been one he would have laughed at. He was apparently an almost agreeable figure if you listened to the implausible tributes from people who actually wanted to chuck him out of the party while he was still a threat to them. But Norman Tebbit profoundly disagreed with the soft and comfortable mistakes weak men made for the country he loved. He wanted to fight them when he could, and laughed at them after his battles were over. It’s just a pity he didn’t win more, but none were braver in the burden they bore to make this a better, and freer, country.
Nothing in what passes for the current Tory agenda holds a candle to what he did and wanted to do.
