Begun, Continued
BY ALAN HOWARTH
Synopsis
Begun, Continued evokes a vanished world of hopes and fears in the 1950s and ’60s before chronicling the fifty years of politics stretching from the vexed era of the 1970s to the turmoil of the Brexit years.
There is much to stimulate thought in this book as Alan Howarth discusses issues with which he has been engaged during his political lifetime:
- The end of empire and new ideas of nationhood, the impact of immigration and Britain’s endless quest for the right relationship with Europe.
- The advent of neoliberalism, its excesses, its divisive effects, the stagnation of productivity and living standards and embattled public services.
- Democracy’s inability adequately to address the paramount issue of climate change.
- Disaffection from politics, experiments with constitutional change, anxieties about corruption and the difficulties of practising democratic politics in a postmodern culture.
He offers his reflections on the challenges for the future of western democracy with the rise of populism across Europe, even before the re-election of Donald Trump to the presidency of the USA.
Author
Alan Howarth spent some years in research, writing and teaching before becoming a senior Conservative Party official during Margaret Thatcher’s opposition years. He entered parliament as Conservative MP for Stratford-on-Avon in 1983. He witnessed with deepening unease the widening of social division in the 1980s.
He was a government whip and an Education Minister in the late 1980s and early ’90s. In 1995, despairing of the Conservative Party’s indifference to the social and economic damage caused by its uncritical espousal of neoliberalism, Alan crossed the floor of the House of Commons to join Labour – the first Conservative MP ever to do so.
Elected as Labour MP for Newport East in 1997, he served in the Blair administration as Minister for Employment, implementing a more humane and constructive deal for the unemployed; as Minister for Equalities, working to strengthen civil rights for disabled people; as Minister for the Arts, advancing a broad agenda to improve provision for the arts and culture and access to them.
In 2005, he was appointed to the House of Lords as Lord Howarth of Newport. Unusually among Labour politicians he supported Brexit.
For many years, Alan has campaigned to gain better recognition and policy support for practitioners of the arts in healthcare.
Endorsements
What a wise, warm and compassionate book this is, exactly as you would expect from someone who has given a lifetime of public service in the truest sense of caring, deeply, about others.
RACHEL CLARK
This is a fascinator of a book on several levels. It is candid on personal and family matters, packed with vignettes of the mighty with whom he worked from Field Marshal Montgomery to Mrs Thatcher, all overlain with Alan’s rich gift for recapturing episode, mood and moment, bound together by his beautiful prose.
PETER HENNESSY
The rich and rewarding life, personal and political, that Alan Howarth has led is beautifully and clearly illuminated. There is interest on every page. From his relatively privileged upbringing, through his full experiences of public life and intense involvement in politics and the arts, to his deeply experienced personal life there is so much here to enlighten and move.
MICHAEL MARMOT
Alan Howarth is that all too rare thing – a wise and generous politician who understood that successful policy should be based upon the complexities and real needs of humanity rather than being imposed from on high.
MONTY DON
I found Alan’s book deeply worthwhile, discussing his work on a great range of issues in parliament and government. As we came to know each other in the House of Lords, and attending mindfulness classes together, I realised what a generous, inspiring man he is, supporting so many people.
An elegant, thoughtful memoir by a respected, principled politician who had the unusual distinction of holding ministerial office in both Tory and Labour governments and yet emerged with his integrity intact.