Misura
The saddest thing about Prescott was that in government, he was mocked mercilessly for his inarticulacy, his jumbling up of words, his tripping over himself linguistically. He was torn apart by the Tory press and many so-called lefty commentators (and comics) as being a thick, working class lump of lard.
And yet in opposition in the period leading up to the ‘97 Labour landslide, when his shadow brief included the Clapham disaster, Zeebrugge, Piper Alpha, the Marchioness, and others, he was sharp, articulate, and tore the Tories apart in parliament for putting profits and privatisation before safety, passengers and workers.
Why the difference? Opposition John Prescott believed in his brief, believed passionately in the cause he was elaborating. But in the Blair government, where he’d been made Deputy PM and had to follow the party line and collective responsibility, he had to defend the indefensible as Blair attacked the working class, went back on the election promises and took Britain into the disastrous Iraq war and more.
It was sad to watch.
