Obituary: Ted Garrett

William Edward Garrett, politician: born Ashington, Northumberland 21 March 1920; staff, ICI 1946-64, Union Organiser 1946-64; member, Prudhoe Urban District Council 1946-64, Northumberland County Council 1955-64; MP (Labour) for Wallsend 1964-92; member, Council of Europe 1979-92; married 1946 Beatrice Kelly (died 1978; one son), 1980 Stephanie Johnson; died London 30 May 1993.

TED GARRETT's maiden speech to the House of Commons on 5 February 1965 was compelling sincere.' There is great difficulty on Tyneside in finding work for young people,' he said.

Many of the young boys leaving the secondary schools have great difficulty in obtaining apprenticeships. In my opinion, this is most unfortunate because many of these boys have gained some technical knowledge while at school. It seems unfortunate that the knowledge that they have gained should be wasted, in view of the future need for skilled craftsmen, and in my opinion it is most urgent that we should make better use of this latent talent of these young boys.

I should like to see the Ministry of Labour, in co-operation with the youth employment officers, set up an apprentice training school, preferably on the north bank of the River Tyne, in my constituency. Those boys who were unable to obtain apprenticeships through the normal industrial channels would be given a recognised apprenticeship at government apprentice schools. On completion of the apprenticeship they would be added to the reservoir of future craftsmen within the country.

For more than a quarter of a century Garrett was to pursue training, employment, and the health of British industry with the same seriousness of purpose.

A good point-scoring politician by the standards of the House of Commons, Garrett was not. However not only his Labour colleagues but Conservatives too listened to him with respect because he obviously knew what he was talking about, meant every word that he said and was the authentic voice of those involved in the day- to-day trade-union problems of Tyneside industry.

Not only MPs of different persuasions listened to him with respect. So too did the managers of British industry. Garrett and I shared a deep interest in both the chemical and the nuclear industries, and we were often invited together to presentations and working meals. Garrett invariably made extremely well-informed and useful contributions designed to help working people. Even with the mighty of British industry Garrett was undaunted in putting forward a sensible view from the workers' angle.

My first clear memory of Garrett is at a lunch in November 1964 when four young Labour MPs were invited by Sir Paul Chambers, then chairman, and his colleagues on the main board of ICI. With calm dignity Garrett, who had been their employee for the previous 18 years, set out the changes that he would like to see the incoming Labour government make. Not only were his parliamentary colleagues impressed, but so were our formidable and powerful hosts. In that hour Garrett did more to create goodwill for the Wilson administration and the white heat of the technological revolution than any number of ministerial utterances.

I shall treasure the occasion a few months later when one 'intellectual' and assertive Labour MP started haranguing our nuclear host Sir William Penny about various supposed iniquities of the nuclear industry. Before Penny could formulate his response to this unreasonable attack, Garrett intervened. When had our colleague last been down a coalmine? Because he, Garrett, would tell him a few things about working conditions in the Northumberland and Durham mines during his childhood in the 1920s and early 1930s.

The price of coal, Garrett pointed out, was the price of pneumocomiosis, and too often the price of life itself. He had attended far too many funerals of young and middle-aged miners to want to chastise the nuclear industry if it provided a well-engineered, and therefore safe, alternative source of power. As we were going out Penny said to me, out of the side of his mouth in his supremely calm way, 'I never witnessed anyone put the nuclear case like that before - Wow] Ted is a man to be reckoned with.'

Garrett came of a mining family and therefore was in a position to say such things. He attended Prudhoe Elementary School and went straight into the mines himself at the age of 14. He served an engineering apprenticeship and in 1940 went into the Merchant Navy. He studied various courses from the London School of Economics and was always proud, rightly, of his efforts to educate himself. From 1946 to 1964 he was a very active member of the trade unions at ICI, mostly in the Billingham area. He was also from 1955 to 1964 an active and influential member of Northumberland County Council, retaining a respect for the dignity of local government that has been notably absent in recent parliaments.

After being Labour candidate for the unwinnable seat of Hexham he was selected for Wallsend. In Parliament he was a most active member of the AEUW group with a special interest in shipbuilding and the problems of merchant seamen. Later in his time in Parliament Garrett raised eyebrows in relation to the vehemence with which he supported the cause of servicemen and women. On 19 October 1989 Garrett said:

Yesterday, together with some of my parliamentary colleagues, I went to see a demonstration by the 15th Infantry Brigade on Salisbury Plain. Members who have experienced Salisbury Plain will know what it is like. The 15th is a North Country brigade recruiting from the Humber right through to the border of Berwick. The 6th Battalion, the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, the 7th Battalion, the Light Infantry at Durham and the 8th Battalion, the Light Infantry at Pontefract, all participated. Had we had counted traditions the 6th Royal Regiment of Fusiliers would have been the 6th Royal Northumberland Fusiliers, the 7th would have been the Durham Light Infantry and the 8th the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry.

Garrett went on to make a call for a return to tradition.

This may have surprised some colleagues in the Parliamentary Labour Party. But I could understand very easily the emotions that propelled Garrett to take up such traditional and, indeed, patriotic causes. Twice in the Eighties I was the guest of the Wallsend Constituency Labour Party and spent the day with him in his own area. He was reflecting the proud patriotic traditions of Tyneside and in particular the memories of those with whom he had served during the war.

It was no accident that it was this kind of patriotism that suggested to Garrett that he should vehemently oppose the cause of Scottish devolution. As one of the ringleaders of the Labour Vote No campaign in the Scottish referendum in 1978-79, I know at first hand that no MP was more steadfast than Garrett in the cause of the United Kingdom. He will be greatly missed as a friend to many of the older generation in the Labour movement.

(Photograph omitted)