Ann Clwyd

John McDonnell Excerpts

Tuesday 19th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Beth Winter]

I thank my hon. Friend for his comments. Again, I could not agree more.

Ann was 100% right in the stand that she made on those humanitarian issues and so many others, such as ending female genital mutilation, and she was not afraid to take unpopular positions on issues she felt very strongly about. Nicole Piche, who was co-ordinator and legal adviser to the all-party parliamentary human rights group when Ann chaired it, said:

“Although she was firmly rooted in and a staunch advocate for the Labour Party, having held a number of Shadow portfolios when Labour was in opposition, she did not hold back when she disagreed with its policies, and was happy to work cross-party to advance the many causes she espoused.”

As we all know, Ann was not afraid to speak her mind without fear or favour. Agree with her or not, whether on the Iraq war or her stance on Brexit, we all have to admire her forthrightness and her ability to keep to her beliefs.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way, and I apologise: I am speaking at a rally in a few minutes’ time, which Ann would have agreed with, so I will have to leave.

The one thing about Ann was that she never gave up, and if you ever crossed her, she never gave up either. I was on a Select Committee last year that was interviewing someone—I will not go into the detail of it, but it was someone she had come across in the 1980s with regard to Vietnam and Laos. She noticed that we were interviewing this individual, so she sent me a 20-page briefing on them and all the subsequent offences, crimes and so on that they had perpetrated. She was not doing it out of spite or anything like that; she was doing it as part of her campaign to expose the injustices that went on at that time and all those who were implicated in them. In some instances that annoyed people, and sometimes her persistence rubbed people up the wrong way, but for me, it made me love her even more.

[Beth Winter]

I thank my right hon. Friend—“persistence” describes Ann in many respects. I have also had the honour of speaking to her longest-standing colleague in Parliament, Lord Campbell-Savours, who referred to Ann as “Clwyd”. He said that “Clwyd was the most courageous woman I have ever met in my life. She was fiercely independent, knew her own mind and refused to be labelled. Clwyd was what I call a real radical.” He repeated the term “radical”—to him, she was the most radical person he had ever met. They were long-standing friends.

I have also spoken to lots of constituents. A local story about Ann’s forthright approach relates to her canvassing in an election. She was using a loudspeaker, which she did very often throughout the Cynon Valley. A local resident came out and started to harangue her, so in very colourful language—not unlike that used recently by the Secretary of State for Education, which I am unable to use here—Ann told him to go away. Unfortunately, she forgot that the loudspeaker was still on, so everybody got to hear Ann’s colourful language. Her language could be colourful at times, as I am sure her family would agree. Another story that I was told was of Ann comparing a Tory MP’s fur collar to a dead cat around her neck when she criticised Ann for her position on late abortions. Ann did a lot of work on abortion rights, which again is an issue that is still in the political melting pot, as women are still having to fight to decriminalise abortion.

Ann had a very deep and personal interest and involvement in health matters over many years, particularly in a personal capacity in her latter years. At one time, she sat as a member of the South Glamorgan health board alongside a Cynon Valley GP, the late Dr Alistair Wilson, who always felt that Ann wanted services to be the best possible for people. She fully supported the national health service, but with a critical eye—and, oh, did she have a critical eye.

Ann did move on the international stage, but that did not prevent her from paying attention to local issues. Like many other people, one young local person—Richard Jones, who is now a disability rights local champion—asked for help. He recalls that when he asked her for help with a school project as a schoolboy, she sent him so much information that he got top marks for it. Later, he was the constituency Labour party chair when she made her retirement speech at the constituency party, so he had known her throughout his life.