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Michael Howard

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For other persons named Michael Howard, see Michael Howard (disambiguation).

The Rt Hon. Michael Howard

Michael Howard, QC (born 7 July 1941) is a British politician and former Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Conservative Party from November 2003 to December 2005. Since becoming an MP at the 1983 General Election, he also held a number of positions in successive Conservative governments until their electoral defeat in 1997, most notably Home Secretary under John Major.

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[edit] Early life

Howard was born in Gorseinon, Wales, where his Romanian Jewish shopkeeper father Bernard Hecht had moved as an economic migrant [1]. His mother, Hilda Kershion, was Welsh-born and of Eastern European Jewish ancestry. When Howard was six, the family name Hecht was anglicised to Howard [2] (he has occasionally been referred to in later life as "Michael Hecht" or even "Michel Hecht", usually by far-right and anti-Semitic people). He attended Llanelli Grammar School and Peterhouse, Cambridge and was President of the Cambridge Union Society in 1962.After taking a 2:1 in the first part of the Economics tripos, he switched to Law and graduated with a 2:2 in 1962. Howard was one of a cluster of bright Conservative students at Cambridge around this time, sometimes referred to as the Cambridge Mafia, many of whom went on to hold high government office under Margaret Thatcher and John Major. (See Cambridge University Conservative Association)

He was called to the Bar (Inner Temple) in 1964 and specialised in employment law and planning issues. In the 1966 election he fought the safe Labour seat of Liverpool Edge Hill, which led to his support for Liverpool F.C.. The late 1960s saw his promotion within the Bow Group where he became Chairman in 1970 shortly after the general election in which he was again defeated at Edge Hill. At the Conservative Party conference of 1970, he made a notable speech commending the government for attempting to curbe trade union power.

At this time Howard was a leading advocate of British membership of the Common Market (EEC) and served on the board of the cross-party Britain in Europe group.

Howard was named as co-respondent in the high profile divorce case of former 1960s model Sandra Paul. She and Howard subsequently married in 1975 (her fourth marriage); their son Nicholas was born in 1976 and daughter Larissa in 1977. Unlike his many Cambridge contemporaries, Howard found it difficult to find and be selected for a winnable parliamentary seat and so continued his career at the Bar where he became a Queen's Counsel in 1982. In June 1982, Howard was finally selected for the constituency of Folkestone and Hythe in succession of the retiring the Sir Albert Costain. He won his seat in the general election of 1983 without difficulty.

[edit] Career in Government

Howard very quickly rose in the ranks of Government, becoming Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Trade and Industry in 1985 with responsibility for regulating the financial dealings of the City of London. This junior post became very important, as he oversaw the Big Bang introduction of new technology in 1986. After the 1987 election he became Minister for Local Government. On behalf of the Government, he accepted the amendment which would become Section 28, and defended its inclusion.

Howard then guided through the House of Commons the Local Government Finance Act 1988. This act brought in Margaret Thatcher's new system of local taxation, officially known as the Community Charge but almost universally nicknamed the poll tax. Howard personally supported the tax and won the respect of Mrs Thatcher for minimising the rebellion against it within the Conservative Party. After a period as Minister for Water and Planning in 1988/89 during which he was responsible for implementing water privatization in England and Wales, Howard was promoted to the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Employment in January 1990 with the resignation of Norman Fowler (who left "to spend more time with his family"). Howard subsequently guided through legislation abolishing the closed shop and campaigned vigorously for Mrs Thatcher in the first ballot of the leadership contest in November 1990. He retained his cabinet post under John Major and campaigned against trade-union power during the 1992 general election campaign.

His work in the campaign led to his appointment as Secretary of State for the Environment in the reshuffle after the election. In this capacity he encouraged the United States to participate in the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, but he was soon after appointed as Home Secretary in a 1993 reshuffle initiated by the sacking of Norman Lamont. His tenure as Home Secretary was especially notable for his tough approach to crime, which he summed up in the soundbite, "prison works". Howard repeatedly clashed with judges and prison reformers as he sought to clamp down on crime through a series of "tough" measures. Under his tenure, recorded crime fell for the first time in over 30 years.

[edit] Infamous interview on Newsnight

His reputation was dented on 13 May 1997 when a critical inquiry into a series of prison escapes was published. In advance of the publication Howard made statements to assign blame to the prison service. A further controversy came when a television interviewer, Jeremy Paxman, relentlessly asked him the same question (12 times in all, and not the widely believed 14 times) during an edition of the Newsnight programme [3]. Asking whether Howard had intervened when Derek Lewis sacked a prison governor, Paxman asked: "Did you threaten to overrule him?" Howard did not give a direct answer, instead repeatedly saying that he "did not overrule him", and ignoring the "threaten" part of the question. The BBC subsequently revealed that the prolonged period where the question was repeated was in fact a "filler" to extend the interview, as technical reasons meant the next segment of that night's Newsnight was not ready for broadcast. While some praised the interview for journalistic toughness, others, including some in the BBC, criticised it as a theatrical stunt. The interview remains one of the most infamous in broadcasting history. In the longer term its precise impact on Howard's reputation remains disputed. Some suggest that it highlighted his arrogant refusal to answer the question; others suggest that it highlighted his resilience and refusal to be bullied, even by one of Britain's toughest interviewers. However, in the same interview, an incredulous Paxman also asked Michael: 'do you seriously expect to be leader of your party?'. In a November 2004 interview (see below) Paxman returned to his question from 1997. Mr Howard was surprised, remarking: "Come on Jeremy, are you really going back over that again? As it happens, I didn't. Are you satisfied now?" eh?[4] This was confirmed in 2005, when under the Freedom of Information Act the Conservative Party obtained documents proving that Howard did not threaten to overrule Derek Lewis.[citation needed]

[edit] First attempt to become Conservative leader

After the 1997 resignation of John Major, Howard and William Hague announced they would be running on the same ticket, with Howard as leader and Hague as Deputy Leader and Party Chairman. However, the day after they agreed this, Hague decided to run on his own. Howard also stood but his campaign was marred by attacks on his record as Home Secretary.

Howard came in last out of five candidates with the support of only twenty-three MPs in the first round of polling for the leadership election. He then withdrew from the race and endorsed the eventual winner William Hague. Howard served as Shadow Foreign Secretary for the next two years but would retire from the Shadow Cabinet in 1999 (though re remained an MP).

[edit] "Something of the night about him," claims Widdecombe

Six days after the Derek Lewis incident on Newsnight, Ann Widdecombe, his former minister of state in the Home Office, made a statement in the House of Commons about the dismissal of then director of the Prison Service, Derek Lewis, and famously remarked of Howard that "there is something of the night about him", a widely quoted comment that fatally damaged his 1997 bid for the Conservative Party leadership. The comment was taken as a reference to his dour demeanour, which she implied was sinister and almost Dracula-like, and related to his Romanian ancestry. Melanie Phillips felt there was a hint of anti-semitism about the remark<ref>The chosen person, Melanie Phillips, Jewish World Review, November 10, 2003</ref>.

[edit] Conservative Leader

After the 2001 General Election Howard was recalled to frontline politics when the Conservatives' new leader Iain Duncan Smith appointed him as Shadow Chancellor. His performances as Shadow Chancellor won him much praise, indeed under his guidance the Conservatives decided to debate the economy on an 'Opposition Day' for the first time since coming to power. After Duncan Smith was removed from the leadership, Howard was elected unopposed as leader of the party in November 2003. As leader, he faced much less discontent within the party than any of his three predecessors and was seen as a steady hand. He avoided repeating such managerial missteps as Duncan Smith's firing of David Davis as Conservative Party Chairman, and imposed discipline quickly and firmly; he removed the party whip from Ann Winterton following her telling of a racist joke. His performances against Tony Blair at the despatch box were more effective than those of his predecessor as leader. He was perhaps helped in all this by the Conservative Party's exhaustion after thirteen years of party turmoil following Margaret Thatcher's overthrow, years which had left the party more willing to unite and rally round a leader.

In February 2004, Howard called on PM Tony Blair to resign over the Iraq war, for failing to ask "basic questions" regarding WMD claims and misleading Parliament [5]. In July the Conservative leader stated that he would not have voted for the motion that authorised the Iraq war had he known the quality of intelligence information on which the WMD claims were based. At the same time, he said he still believed in the Iraq invasion was right because "the prize of a stable Iraq was worth striving for". [6] His criticism of Blair did not earn Howard sympathies in Washington DC, where President Bush refused to meet him. Karl Rove is reported to have told Howard, "you can forget about meeting the president. Don't bother coming." [7]

Michael Howard was named 2003 Parliamentarian of the Year by The Spectator and Zurich UK. This was in recognition of his performance at the despatch box in his previous role as Shadow Chancellor.

[edit] Crossing swords with Paxman

In November 2004, Newsnight again concentrated on Howard with coverage of a campaign trip to Cornwall and an interview with Jeremy Paxman. The piece, which purported to show that members of the public were unable to identify Howard and that those who recognized him did not support him, was the subject of an official complaint from the Conservative Party. The complaint claimed that the Newsnight team only spoke to people who held opinions against either Michael Howard or the Conservatives, and that Paxman's style was bullying and unnecessarily aggressive.

[edit] 2005 Election

In the May 2005 general election Michael Howard's party failed to unseat the Labour Government, although the Conservatives did gain 33 seats -- five from the Liberal Democrats -- and Labour's majority shrank from 167 to 66. The Conservative share of the national vote only ticked up by 0.6% from 2001 and 1.6% from 1997. However, because of the first past the post British voting system, the seats won in parliament for all parties did not reflect their proportionate overall share of the national vote. Commentators pointed to the state of Britain's constituency boundaries -- that heavily discriminated in favour of the Labour Party. It is estimated that changes proposed by the Boundary Commission for England would result in a gain of 10-20 seats for the Conservatives with no change in the vote.

The day after the election, Howard stated in a speech in the newly-gained Conservative seat in Putney that he would not lead the party into the next General Election as he would be "too old", and that he would stand down "sooner rather than later", following a revision of the Conservative leadership electoral process. Despite the election of a third consecutive Labour government, Howard described the election as "the beginning of a recovery" for the Conservative party after Labour's landslide victories in 1997 and 2001.

Howard's own constituency of Folkestone and Hythe had been heavily targeted by the Liberal Democrats as the most sought after prize of their "decapitation" strategy of seeking to gain the seats of prominent Conservatives. Yet Howard almost doubled his majority to 11,680, whilst the Liberal Democrats saw their vote fall.

[edit] Criticism of 2005 campaign

During the 2005 campaign, Howard was criticised by some commentators for conducting a campaign which addressed the issues of immigration, asylum seekers and travellers, when he himself was the descendant of immigrants. Others point out that the continued media coverage of such issues created most of the controversy and that Howard merely defended his views when questioned at unrelated policy launches. Some evidence suggested that the public generally supported policies proposed by the Conservative Party when they were not told which party had proposed them, indicating that the party still had an image problem.[citation needed] Many middle class voters found Howard's perceived election campaign emphasis to be disagreeable: amongst key ABC1 voters (e.g. doctors, lawyers, students, managers), the party's lead over Labour disappeared, compared with a 30-percentage-point lead under John Major in 1992. [8]

The focus on immigration was widely alleged to have been influenced by Howard's election adviser Lynton Crosby, who has been alleged to have used similar tactics in Australian elections. [9] Whether the hiring of Crosby was a good idea or not in hindsight, his organisation of the campaign was credited with making the Conservative election drive much more professional and organised than at the previous election.

During the campaign, Howard continued to impose strong party discipline, controversially forcing the deselection of Danny Kruger (Sedgefield), Adrian Hilton (Slough) and Howard Flight (Arundel & South Downs).

[edit] Cash for Peerages

On 23 October 2006, Michael Howard revealed that he had voluntarily been questioned as a potential witness concerning the Cash for Peerages investigation surrounding fundraising and the 2005 election campaign. He was not arrested or cautioned and is not suspected of any criminal activity.<ref>Howard quizzed in honours probe BBC News 23 October 2006</ref>

[edit] Final months as party leader

Despite announcing after the 2005 General Election that he would vacate the role of party leader, Howard performed a substantial reshuffle of the party's front bench on the 10th May in which several rising star MPs were given their first shadow portfolios, in particular George Osborne and David Cameron. This move cleared the way for David Cameron (who had worked for Howard as Policy Advisor when Howard was Home Secretary) to run for the Conservative Party leadership.

The reforms to the party's election process took a number of months and Howard held power as leader for six months of the new parliament. During that period, he enjoyed a fairly pressure-free time, often making joking comparisons between himself and Tony Blair, both of whom had declared they would not stand at the next General Election. He also oversaw Blair's first parliamentary defeat, when the Conservative Party, the Liberal Democrats and sufficient Labour Party rebels voted against government proposals to extend to 90 days the period that terror suspects could be held for without charge. Howard stood down as leader in December of 2005 and was replaced by David Cameron.

Howard announced on 17th March 2006 that he will be standing down as MP for Folkestone and Hythe at the next election, expected to be held in 2009 or 2010 [10].

[edit] See also

[edit] References

<references/>

[edit] External links

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by:
Albert Costain 		Member of Parliament for Folkestone and Hythe
1983 – present 		Incumbent
Political offices
Preceded by:
Norman Fowler 		Secretary of State for Employment
1990–1992 		Succeeded by:
Gillian Shephard
Preceded by:
Michael Heseltine 		Secretary of State for the Environment
1992–1993 		Succeeded by:
John Gummer
Preceded by:
Kenneth Clarke 		Home Secretary
1993–1997 		Succeeded by:
Jack Straw
Preceded by:
Michael Portillo 		Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer
2001–2003 		Succeeded by:
Oliver Letwin
Preceded by:
Iain Duncan Smith 		Leader of the British Conservative Party
2003–2005 		Succeeded by:
David Cameron
Leader of the Opposition
2003–2005


Leaders of the Conservative Party
The Duke of Wellington, Sir Robert Peel, The Earl of Derby, Benjamin Disraeli, The Marquess of Salisbury, Arthur Balfour, Andrew Bonar Law, Stanley Baldwin, Neville Chamberlain, Winston Churchill, Anthony Eden, Harold Macmillan, Sir Alec Douglas-Home, Edward Heath, Margaret Thatcher, John Major, William Hague, Iain Duncan Smith, Michael Howard, David Cameron
cy:Michael Howard

de:Michael Howard fr:Michael Howard (homme politique) ja:マイケル・ハワード (イギリスの政治家) no:Michael Howard nn:Michael Howard pl:Michael Howard fi:Michael Howard sv:Michael Howard zh:迈克尔·霍华德

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