Events | 2009.12.12
Obituaries 2009: Jack Jones
The trade unionist, who died peacefully at 96 on 21 April, is remembered for his passion and good humour by the veteran Labour politician
I first knew Jack when he was a regional leader of the Transport and General Workers\' Union and I was shadow transport secretary in the 1950s. When Labour formed governments in 1964 and 1974, I was a cabinet minister and Jack had risen to be the great socialist leader of the T&G: I received many words of encouragement and criticism from him at that period, all of which were fully justified.
After the Common Market referendum campaign in 1975, which the "No" campaigners lost, Harold Wilson moved me from my industry post in cabinet, which Jack was very vocal in trying to prevent. In those days, before the Tories\' attack on trade union rights, workers\' leaders rightly had a say in government policy and decisions which would affect their members. It was a mark of the personal influence that Jack had in the Labour movement that some in the establishment in the late 60s and early 70s considered him to be a "security risk"!
At his 80th birthday party at the TUC, Jack responded to the warm tributes that were paid to him by arguing the case for active trade unionism like a young shop steward in his 20s. Jack was a man for the future and not someone resting on past achievements; he led the pensioners\' national movement with as much energy as he did his beloved transport workers.
Jack was a Liverpudlian and in his life revealed all the best qualities of those who come from that great city. He had a charming smile and a typical Scouser\'s quick wit, which helped explain the influence he had over the many audiences he addressed, and why they loved him as they did. My memories of him are always less about what he achieved and more about his energy and dedication, right up to the end of his life, to what he believed in.
His wife, Evelyn, predeceased him by a few years. She had first been married to a friend of Jack\'s who was killed fighting with the republicans in the Spanish civil war. Jack, too, fought in Spain and subsequently married Evelyn, who was a very formidable socialist herself. He never really got over the loss. Despite his bereavement he continued to support his friends – including the MP Geoffrey Robinson, who had invited him to the launch of his book shortly after Evelyn died. He turned up, sad but smiling, in his trademark cap.
His loyalty to his friends was one of the nicest attributes of the man, and his dying left me and many of his friends and colleagues with a deep sense of personal loss.★
For more information, please visit
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2[...]ones-tony-benn-obituaries-2009
