Guest post from Louise Mensch: "Tony Benn represented something truly valuable in the world"

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I was so sad to hear - via Mumsnet in fact - of the death of Tony Benn, a man I never actually met. I did once tell his son Hillary, a Labour MP, how much I admired his father - but that was a close as I got.

Tony Benn represented something truly valuable in the world. He acted on what he believed. For his love of socialism, he was prepared to walk away from a peerage, and even from the nobility of his family name. No longer Viscount Stansgate, he wouldn't even allow people to call him Anthony Wedgewood-Benn - he was to be "Tony Benn". And so he remained, until he died.

There was that rumpled, brilliant look about the man that is so endearing to our clever, messy nation. Like JRR Tolkien, whom he resembled, he loved to smoke a pipe; a particularly English vice. He drank tea, and was well-read. He seems never to have regretted walking away from "my Lord" and the bowing and scraping of the era.

Benn also possessed, as well as conviction, a great generosity of spirit. His respect and affection for Margaret Thatcher showed him to be a man who understood that political opposition does not have to, and should not, equal enmity (more Labour MPs wrote me kind notes after I resigned my seat than Conservative ones, by the way). Benn said of Thatcher "she was a signpost, not a weathervane". That was why he respected her; and it is why I respected him.

He had convictions; he lived those convictions. He was true to himself, bright, and kind. He was raised by a feminist mother, and it showed, in the best possible way. Labourlist drew my attention to his generous piece on Thatcher which told this story:

"I remember her at the funeral of MP Eric Heffer. I was asked to make a speech and as I was waiting, there was someone behind me coughing. It was Mrs Thatcher, and at the end I thanked her for coming and she burst into tears. She had come out of respect for someone whose opinions she disagreed with."

I believe that there are a great many MPs and commentators who did not share any of Benn's beliefs, but who realise today that in him, we have lost a national treasure; a genuine servant of the people, who did not need to be a nobleman, to be a noble man. May many of us involved in politics on all sides learn from his lessons of authenticity, humility, generosity, and kindness.

I think you'll agree that being intellectual is not as important as being principled, authentic and moral. They said on TV that Tony Benn was not a particulatly bright student at Westminster School.

They give Tory MP, David Willets, the nickname 'Two Brains', but he still comes out with rubbish about the 'intergenerational divide' and 'intergenerational injustice'.

What really counts is serving people and bettering people's lives and that is down to heart rather than mind.

I think Louise was asked to write about Tony Benn and she wrote a sincere and heartfelt piece. She didn't do it for publicity. She doesn't need MN, they need her.

If I was her, I would have been shocked at how it was received by some posters and I would have been angered. The attacks on her were not fair and MNHQ should have stepped in and possibly pulled the thread. But Louise has nothing to be ashamed of and deleting the thread would have seemed as if she had.

I think she is right to point out that she has achieved more than most of her detractors have.

MN needs Louise Mensch? Why, in heaven's name, why?

Because as many people have said, they want the publicity. They want to be relevant. They want big names to contribute so that they can claim that they are where it is at, that big names read MN and contribute and that MN is the forum where famous figures and not so famous all meet.

If someone asks me to write about something that I feel I don't know enough about, I refuse. If you have to begin an obituary by saying 'I never knew or even met the man, but I did once meet his son', that's your clue right there.

Louise Mensch is not a big name, Claig. Sorry, and all that, but she isn't.

They invite politicians on, they do surveys that help the politicians and the "charities" and that give input to the "think tanks" of the politicians. They want to be at the heart of the nation's discussions and at the service of the politicians and to do that they have to invite big names on so that we think that this is where it is at.

'Louise Mensch is not a big name'

She is bigger than most of us.

But Louise Mensch is not a politician any more! And as I said, not a big name.

LM is not in any way a 'big name'- she bobbed up in my awareness and disappeared just as quickly, and didn't impress in that brief time (incl some awful performance on a Select Cmte - she just seems, in these circs., to have something of a shared space in the Venn Diagram of social media and profile with HQ and nothing else.

But hardly a big political draw. a) She is no longer an MP b) She no longer lives in UK c) She writes fluffy chick lit (apparently Mr Mensch's ex wife was quite disturbed by one of the books, life echoing (chick) literature, as it were...). If they wanted a big political draw, how about Teresa May, Justine Greening, Esther McVey, Harriet Harman... oooh, I could go on.

So much the better because it musn't become too obvious. Inviting labour luvvies on would not be subtle.

Labour Luvvies - Justine Greening? Teresa May?

Are you Louise's sockie, Claig?

' If they wanted a big political draw, how about Teresa May, Justine Greening, Esther McVey, Harriet Harman... oooh, I could go on'

Because there would be MNers who would not like to have serving politicians getting free access to speak on this forum. They would start to wonder if they were being spun by luvvies.

'Labour Luvvies - Justine Greening? Teresa May?'

MN is left wing. They won't promote Conservative politicians and if they do, they know exactly the response that these politicians will get. A similar response to what Louise got and she isn't even a current politician.

I am not left wing. I think there would have been reasoned debate if they had got someone right wing, who was a fairly serious politician, and who had met and worked with TB to come on here. Louise got the response she did because of her trite and fluffy blog (Northernlurker and BIWI summed it up perfectly well; I'm not going to repeat what they said.) I've got a friend who's a Tory MP - fairly sure he would have been happy to do this.

Did they ask any politicians to come on to speak about right wing Thatcher, who was a bigger national figure than Tony Benn?

If a Tory had come on, the abuse would have been unprintable and no Labour luvvie would have had a nice word to say about Thatcher.

I think they asked Louise to help their own image and because they knew that Louise was a decent person who would say nice things about left wing Tony Benn.

I don't agree that Mumsnet needs Ms Mensch.

Claig - how on earth can you expect anyone to take you seriously when you will insist on calling people labour luvvies repeatedly.

Anyway, this thread is not about party politics.

claig, that's a really sad post. The man has just died, for goodness' sake. It should not require a specially sourced 'decent person' to 'say nice things' - I would bloody hope most people could be required to show basic respect. And I don't believe she has.

Agree with mintyy, with bells on.

Of course this thread is about politics. If Louise Mensch had been a LibDem poitician or heaven forbid, a Labour politician, she would not have had half of the attacks that she has had. There would have been no "shoddy", no "lightweight", nothing.

LRD, there are some people who would not say nice things about Tony Benn, but Louise is not one of them.

There were many people who said nasty things about Thatcher. Unfortunately, nasty people do exist.

What LRD and Mintyy have said.

Blimey. A levels at dawn..

Claig - why can't you get it? The objection to LM is NOT to do with her being a Tory.