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.

It wasn't. I entered the Peterhouse college Cambridge historical essay prize (a national competition at the time), came third and was offered a place to study there. 5000 words on. "We shall not understand political history if we treat it as merely a branch of economic history." I was grateful but really wanted to try for Oxford. I liked it and English better

Well I do, I have never forgotten the pleasure that he showed when he said that he drinks a mug of tea every hour. It endeared him to me, because he loved his tea. It is about heart.

And I will never now forget what I have recently read about him. That he bought the park bench on which he proposed to his wife and put it in his garden.

These things are about passion and heart. Those are the things that the public admire. They make this giant with lofty ideals and principles as human as everyone of us. We identify with him and his autenticity and heart.

That is what made him special and different to many other politicians who will do and say anything for advancement.

He was real, he was one of us and that is why he is one of our national treasures - a treasure to the left and to the right. And that is why nobody should try and divide us and say that Louise has "a nerve" to express what she felt about him.

I'm 43.

Just a slight pull back to the reality-based community, as bloggers over here love to have it.

I also suspect they wanted somebody engaged on social media. I have 80k + twitter followers, and that's more than most politicians. Blogging has a certain type of audience.

I don't know if these replies are nesting under the posts they're answering because I only have my phone here, but, thank you Claig. I appreciate it. I agree with you about the tea observation which is why I included it, along with the pipe. For many not very political types, pipe and tea are endearing. I find it interesting - virtuous in an old fashioned sense - that too much tea and a very old-fashioned way to consume tobacco were his vices, rather than booze and "good lunches". It says a lot about him. Firstly that he remained a man in control. Secondly that he remained rooted in the class of his birth despite himself and that makes his renunciation of the title and double barreled name all the nobler. Thirdly, pipes are so English and s

God I hate this sensitive touch screen. Sorry. Pipes and tea both say "England" to me rather than Britain in general. And the combination of both along with great brains and massive mess (if you've seen pictures of his archives) offer a touch of the absent-minded professor who concentrates his brilliance on just one thing, there not being room for anything else.

Exactly. Good point about the pipe. In fact, that is one of the first things we all think about when we think of Harold Wilson too. Little things are so important.

Whilst I appreciate that you have 80k+ followers on Twitter, I still stand by my opinion that you were not the right choice for an obituary about Tony Benn.

You hadn't even met him.

I still cannot, despite your protestations, understand why you were the go-to person about Tony Benn.

Whilst these memories of him are endearing, it's actually rather insulting to bring these to the fore, rather than talk about his politics, his achievements and how he adhered to his principles and his values. There's a brilliant cartoon in today's Independent on Sunday that says far more about him.

here

Stop trivialising things by talking about tea and pipes ffs.

Fwiw I don't understand Russell Brand writing about Margaret Thatcher either. Even though, I quite like him and I hated her.

Louise I'm glad you are now aware of the use of your 'followers'

It is nice to see someone learn something

How did the victim of Ched Evan's feel when you alerted your followers to their name being posted on Twitter?
By alerting thousands of your 'followers' to someone else breaching this person's anonymity you therefore alerted thousands of your followers to the breach who might not otherwise have been aware.
Great.

Finally Joey Essex has 2.5 million followers, I wouldn't value his opinion any more than yours by dint of his number of followers.

Laura,

Because he has much older children who cannot move to England, whereas my much younger children and former husband were all Americans from New York and could move.

Sometimes it comes down to children.

I did not want to resign my seat and looked extensively for ways to avoid it. There was no other option. I literally may not (and I don't mean will not) elaborate further.

For what it is worth, I do believe that having a column in the UK's best read paper for almost 18 months now has given me a decent level of domestic political reach.

'Stop trivialising things by talking about tea and pipes ffs'

No, we admire everything about him, the whole picture, both the big and the small. It is part of what he was, and we admire the whole human being, the authenticity, the ideas and the way he lived and the things he enjoyed.

I have 137 followers on twitter. Less is more.

I have 3. Not bad considering I've only ever tweeted 4 times, I reckon

(Of course, I didn't go to Oxford or Cambridge, which probably explains it.)

your cat doesn't count tea.

Thanks Pans. I'm not sure I was lucid, more gobsmacked this was turning from an obituary to an opportunity for a 43 year old woman to boast about her A Level results.

Since the consensus seems to be this wasn't a spoof response, I'll leave it til HQ say whether it's real.

Finally Joey Essex has 2.5 million followers, I wouldn't value his opinion any more than yours by dint of his number of followers.

Oh, that's a bit unfair, Ronald. His piece on the death of Mandela in the Huff Post was really moving...

Dear God this thread has now made me read lovely Louise's tweets regarding Bob Crow

Mumsnet Towers has done us a massive disservice by asking Mensch to give us her opinion.
Mensch tried her best in her little piece and we should be very, very grateful that someone as accomplished, steadfast and dedicated made time from her holiday to do so.

I will be asking Peterhouse why they offered a student a place to study at the University on the basis of coming third in an essay competition. Did they make the same offers to all those taking third place?? Questions, questions...

I used the word vacuous.

For what it's worth, I have (counts on fingers) 5 degrees from Oxbridge, and have taught in one of the two universities for many years, so if you want to have that little battle, I win. But why would you? A degree from Oxford is evidence of very little - I can assure you that I see students graduate every year who are both intellectually vacuous and rubbish writers to boot. In fact, I'm sure you and I could both name a few who have since become cabinet ministers. But beyond that - a fully-grown adult seeking to establish intellectual superiority by invoking their A-levels and Oxford degree? I'm with LRD, that's so astoundingly chippy and insecure that I have to wonder if the posts are a spoof.

In any case, it was the writing I called vacuous, not you. I didn't want a hagiography of the man - his legacy is hardly uncontroversial even on the Left; the Guardian obituary was a masterpiece of ambivalence! What I did want was an obituary by someone qualified to write it, either because they knew Benn well, or because they have a position in British politics and intellectual life that gives them special insight. You don't tick either box, and if you'd had an ounce of self-awareness, you'd have refused to write about a subject you know nothing about.

'I can assure you that I see students graduate every year who are both intellectually vacuous and rubbish writers to boot'

I always did feel sorry for those who had to teach David Miliband and Edward Michael Balls.

If you described those two as vacuous, then there'd be absolutely no disagreement!

You should hear what one old professor who taught Cameron had to say about him...

In any case, you're quite right claig that intellectual vacuity doesn't respect party boundaries.

I'm not surprised.

Isn't the issue that, if you have to argue 'but I shouldn't come across as vacuous because I am quite well educated,' you've already lost the battle?