“I liked her and apparently she liked me. We had a common interest in good food and wine.”
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Edward Heath
Sir Edward Richard George Heath was a British statesman and politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1970 to 1974 and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1965 to 1975. Heath also served for 51 years as a Member of Parliament from 1950 to 2001. Outside politics, Heath was a yachtsman, a musician, and an author.
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culture · Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1970 to 1974 · politician · military personnel · journalist · conductor · also Edward Heath, Teddy, Ted Heath, Sir Edward Richard George Heath, Heath
Born 9 July 1916 · Died 17 July 2005 · Q128967
94 published statements · 0 followers
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2026· 6 entries
“s Today programme. The menu Cured duck breast with melon and pickled ginger Roast troncon of turbot with hollandaise sauce, Cornish new potatoes and seasonal vegetables Golden raspberry cranachan with Chivas Regal”
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“I had hoped I would never see unemployment reach this level and our measures are going to take longer to have an affect than I hoped.”
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“I want to see the end of your government!”
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“t said rejoice twice, he had said it three times. This is the new imperialism, and I am against the new imperialism. It is not our job to go throwing our forces around the world and saying”
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Public attention spiked: 8,240 Wikipedia readers in one day, 5.8× the usual 1,425, with 0 article edits.
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2022· 1 entry
The Guardian: From May to Heath: Tories who have faced votes on their leadership
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2021· 2 entries
The Guardian: Police chief who led inquiry into Ted Heath faces misconduct charges
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The Guardian: Conservative students go wild as Edward Heath is dumped as patron – archive, 2 April 1985
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2020· 1 entry
The Guardian: How Edward Heath taking a bath exposed Chequers' lax security
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2018· 1 entry
"Nick", whose real name is Carl Beech, was arrested and charged over child pornography offences and in January 2019 he pleaded guilty
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2010· 1 entry
That Coleman was able to provide "little or no information" to back up this statement, that no man had ever claimed to have had a sexual relationship with Heath, nor was any trace of homosexuality to be found in his pape
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2007· 1 entry
That Heath, to protect his career, had stopped cottaging in the 1950s
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2005· 12 entries
Died 2005-07-17.
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“Everyone who is already here must be treated as equal before the law.”
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“Robin Day: But how low does your personal rating, among your own supporters, have to go before you consider yourself a liability to the party you lead?Edward Heath: Well, popularity isn't everything. In fact it isn't the most important thing. What matters is doing what you believe to be right, and that's what I've always tried to do and I shall go on doing. The question doesn't arise.”
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“That, although a century out of date, would certainly be a distinctive, different policy. But it would not be a Conservative policy and it would not provide a Conservative alternative. For better or worse the central Government is already responsible, in some way or another, for nearly half the activities of Britain. It is by far the biggest spender and the biggest employer.”
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“If there are any who believe that immigrants to this country, most of whom have already become British citizens, could be forcibly deported because they are coloured people...then that I must repudiate, absolutely and completely.”
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“I have always had a hidden wish, a frustrated desire, to run a hotel.”
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“It is the unpleasant and unacceptable face of capitalism, but one should not suggest that the whole of British industry consists of practices of this kind.”
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“Government, management and unions...have now...jointly embarked for the first time in Britain, on the path of working out together how to create and share the nation's wealth for the benefit of all the people. It is an offer to employers and unions to share fully with the Government the benefits and the obligations involved in running the national economy.”
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“[I]ncreasingly the use of violence has become not the last resort of the desperate, but the first resort of those whose simple unconstructive aim is anarchy. That we must all surely resist. Anarchy is not a prescription for peace, justice and progress. It achieves nothing but the suffering of innocent men and women.”
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“We will have to embark on a change so radical, a revolution so quiet and yet so total, that it will go far beyond the programme for a parliament.”
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“It would not be in the interests of the Community that its enlargement should take place except with the full-hearted consent of the parliaments and its peoples of the new member countries.”
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“My position has remained the same. I have had more to do, at first hand, with European policy than any other person in politics today.”
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1997· 2 entries
Awarded honorary doctorate presented by The Open University (1997).
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Career landmark: member of the 52nd Parliament of the United Kingdom (1997–2001).
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1996· 1 entry
Won Robert Schuman Medal (1996).
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1993· 1 entry
Devoted four pages to a discussion of the evidence concerning Heath's sexuality
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1992· 3 entries
Awarded Knight of the Garter (1992).
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Career landmark: member of the 51st Parliament of the United Kingdom (1992–1997).
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Stated in the House of Commons that government should build a fund of reserves to counter currency speculators
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1991· 1 entry
That his "brusqueness, his gaucherie, his lack of small or indeed any talk, his sheer bad manners" were among the factors costing him the support of Conservative backbenchers in the subsequent Conservative leadership ele
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1990· 1 entry
Flew to Baghdad to attempt to negotiate the release of aircraft passengers on British Airways Flight 149 and other British nationals taken hostage when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait
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1988· 1 entry
Heath recorded Beethoven's Triple Concerto, Op
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1987· 3 entries
Continued to follow political life and it was always a pleasure to meet with him
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Career landmark: member of the 50th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1987–1992).
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Was nominated in the election for the Chancellorship of the University of Oxford but lost to Roy Jenkins as a result of splitting the Conservative vote with Lord Blake
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1985· 1 entry
Heath hired Derek Frost, life partner of Jeremy Norman, to modernise and redecorate the house in Salisbury
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1983· 1 entry
Career landmark: member of the 49th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1983–1987).
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1979· 2 entries
Career landmark: member of the 48th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1979–1983).
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To 18% in 1980 then fall to 4% by 1983, but had seen unemployment double from around 1
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1978· 1 entry
By Oxford University Press, which contained the music and lyrics to a wide variety of Christmas carols, each accompanied by a reproduction of a piece of religious art and a short introduction by Heath
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1976· 1 entry
Awarded doctor honoris causa from the Paris-Sorbonne University (1976).
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1975· 1 entry
Played a major role in the referendum on British membership of the EEC, campaigning for the eventually successful "remain" vote
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1974· 7 entries
Career landmark: member of the 46th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1974–1974).
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Career landmark: member of the 47th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1974–1979).
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To Heath not having a family, was a deliberate hint that he was gay, in order to discredit him
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And 1975 and remaining an honoured guest in China on frequent visits thereafter and forming a close relationship with Mao's successor Deng Xiaoping
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By which time Heath was no longer in office
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Opened the £450,000 Bob Lord Stand at the club's Turf Moor stadium
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Career landmark: Leader of the Opposition (1974–1975).
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1973· 3 entries
A statutory commitment to uprate national insurance benefits in line with prices was introduced
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When he led the United Kingdom into membership of what would later become the European Union
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The first concessionary coal payments scheme was introduced by order, which provided for reimbursement to the National Coal Board "of the full cost of concessionary coal to men aged 55 to 59 who qualified for benefits un
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1972· 3 entries
And 1974 "to lower the minimum qualifying age for pensions increase from 60 to 55 and to provide for all pensions paid to widows of scheme members to be increased
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A procedure was introduced under which claimants from outside an area who had moved to that area in search of work had one week to find a job before being cut off
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Preservation of accrued pension benefits after 5 or more years' service was introduced
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1971· 4 entries
And in 1972 he led the reformation of local government, significantly reducing the number of local authorities and creating several new metropolitan counties, much of which remains to this day
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A series of measures was introduced designed to limit the availability of supplementary benefit
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Heath sent MI6 officer Frank Steele to hold talks with the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) and find common ground to begin official negotiations
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– while prime minister – and also captained the team in the 1979 Fastnet Race
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1970· 7 entries
Election won: 1970 election.
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A Conservative policy document emerged from the Selsdon Park Hotel that offered free-market–oriented policies as solutions to the country's unemployment and inflation problems
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Career landmark: member of the 45th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1970–1974).
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Campaign: 1970 election.
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To review pensions every two years, but instead instituted an annual review
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To 50,000 in 1972; a fall that was largely attributable to the introduction of the Family Income Supplement
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Career landmark: Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1970–1974).
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1969· 1 entry
And won the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race that year
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1968· 1 entry
Which provided benefits for men aged 55 or over on redundancy who otherwise satisfied the requirements of the scheme, there was pressure to enhance the terms available to enable such men to receive concessionary coal as
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1966· 1 entry
Career landmark: member of the 44th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1966–1970).
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1965· 2 entries
Career landmark: Leader of the Conservative Party (1965–1975).
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Career landmark: Leader of the Opposition (1965–1970).
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1964· 4 entries
Had inherited an unemployment count of around 400,000 but saw unemployment peak at 631,000 in early 1967
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Despite substantial opposition from many Conservative MPs and independent grocers and shopkeepers, Heath led a successful fight to abolish resale price maintenance
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Career landmark: member of the 43rd Parliament of the United Kingdom (1964–1966).
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Career landmark: Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer (1964–1965).
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1963· 4 entries
Awarded Charlemagne Prize (1963).
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Career landmark: Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade (1963–1964).
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And chosen on the advice of his friend, the pianist Moura Lympany – and conducting Christmas carol concerts in Broadstairs every year from his teens until old age
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Was made President of the Board of Trade by Alec Douglas-Home
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1960· 2 entries
Macmillan appointed Heath Lord Privy Seal with responsibility for the negotiations to secure the UK's first attempt to join the European Communities (or Common Market, as it was then more widely known)
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Career landmark: Lord Privy Seal (1960–1963).
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1959· 2 entries
Career landmark: member of the 42nd Parliament of the United Kingdom (1959–1964).
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Career landmark: Secretary of State for Employment (1959–1960).
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1955· 2 entries
And in 1959 was appointed to the Cabinet by Harold Macmillan as Minister of Labour
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Career landmark: Member of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom (1955).
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1939· 1 entry
“I am sometimes accused of being oversensitive about unemployment. I do not believe that that is possible, certainly not for anyone who lived through the 1930s and saw the political consequences of high unemployment throughout Western Europe and what happened in 1939.”
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1938· 1 entry
Visited Barcelona, then under attack from Spanish Nationalist forces during the Spanish Civil War
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1937· 1 entry
Where he met leading Nazis Hermann Göring, Joseph Goebbels, and Heinrich Himmler at an SS cocktail party
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1936· 1 entry
Was in opposition to the appeasement of Germany by returning her colonies, confiscated during the First World War
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1935· 1 entry
With the aid of a county scholarship he went up to study at Balliol College, Oxford
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1916· 1 entry
Born 1916-07-09.
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