Ann Widdecombe RIP

I was saddened to learn of the death of Ann Widdecombe and horrified to learn that the police are treating her death as murder. A 26-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of the crime.






















We don't yet know who killed her or why, and must not rush to conclusions until or unless there is a conviction. 

There will be those who say that this suggests we need to review the security of people involved in politicians, and I can see the logic of that, but if you regard someone like Ann as a potential target you are in danger of having to provide protection for the entire political class. It is decades since she was a front bench MP, years since she was an MEP, and although she had some controversial opinions nobody with an ounce of judgement who met her for more than five minutes would consider that she had a malicious bone in her body.

I met Ann Widdecombe many years ago when I was a Conservative constituency chairman (the first time) and she visited the association as a front-bench spokesman as a guest speaker. We had all sorts of last minute adjustments to her schedule because the event took place on the day the Roman Catholic Primate of England, Cardinal Basil Hume, died and the BBC wanted to interview her as a prominent catholic politician. 

To her credit, Ann refused to leave us in the lurch and bail on her speaking engagement with us, and in the end the BBC interviewed her together with the former Archbishop of Canterbury, the Very Reverend Robert Runcie MC, at the same venue where she had spoken to us and shortly afterwards.

Ann would have been the last person to expect anyone to indulge in the hypocrisy of pretending you agree with someone when you didn't, and I am quite certain she would not object to me saying that I thought when she was right she was brilliant and when she was wrong her views were sometimes completely off-the-wall. She was her own woman and she always said exactly what she thought.

She had a political journey from Conservative to Brexit party to Reform: but on that journey she generated none of the bitterness and sense of betrayal among her former friends and colleagues that some others who walked that road have produced.

Kemi Badenoch said:

"My deepest condolences and those of the Conservative Party to the family and friends of Ann Widdecombe. She was a formidable politician who was never afraid to speak her mind and fought hard for what she believed. Always true to herself, her politics were strongly guided by her faith and her values.

Rest in Peace, Ann."

Britain's politics is poorer and less interesting without Ann Widdecombe and she will be missed.

Rest in Peace.

Comments

Chris Whiteside said…
Normal obituary rules apply to this post. You can post a response to anything I have written above as long as there is no political point-scoring - this is not the time or place - and no personal attacks.
8:22 pm
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