The nearest I came to becoming a Member of Parliament
I was interested in the news that Austin Mitchell is to step down as a Member of Parliament at the General Election next year.
Mitchell first became am MP in 1977 when he fought and won a bye-election in Grimsby occasioned by the premature death of the sitting Labour MP and Foreign Minister Anthony Crosland. He was selected as the Labour candidate for that election at a local Labour Party meeting in the Town Hall held on Friday 1 April 1977.
Over 100 individuals applied to be the Labour candidate and six were shortlisted for the actual selection meeting. Mitchell was a local television presenter at the time and very well known and liked in the area. He easily won the selection.
However, I was one of the six on the short list, having previously fought the two General Elections of 1974 as a Labour candidate and at the time of the Grimsby selection serving as a Political Adviser to a Member of the Labour Cabinet.
I came second to Mitchell, although many were kind enough to suggest that mine was the best speech of the evening. After the decision, I made some remarks on behalf of the five unsuccessful individuals and said: “I wish you a famous victory”.
Mitchell won the bye-election for the marginal seat and has been the local MP ever since. I was not quite 29 years old at the time, subsequently my life went in a different direction, and in the end I never entered Parliament.