THE LATE EARL OF AVON

HL Deb 18 January 1977 vol 379 cc1-21

The LORD PRIVY SEAL (Lord Peart)

My Lords, it is now four days since the death of the noble Earl, Lord Avon, and moving tributes have been paid to his memory here and abroad. The opportunity to join in the tributes comes to us a little late but nevertheless we welcome it, because we all mourn the death of a great statesman and a great patriot. It is well known that his period of office as Prime Minister from 1955 to 1957, a period which should have been the summit of his career, coincided with a decline in his health and obscured the great achievements of his years as Foreign Secretary. But we shall not let this dim our memory of his years of greatness or his striking contribution to the history of our country.

Sir Anthony Eden came to prominence as Lord Privy Seal at the age of 36, and then Foreign Secretary aged 38, the youngest man to hold the office for more than 100 years. He held Ministerial office with few interruptions for 26 years. But the charisma of the dashing young diplomat was already obvious it a much earlier age.

May I strike a little personal note. When I was a small boy—I must have been about eight years of age or younger—I can remember him fighting his first election in 1922, in the Spennymoor constituency in County Durham. My school was a polling station and, peeping over the wall, I could not help being impressed by the tall Conservative candidate, with his handsome face, Black hair and moustache. He came from an old North-country Durham family with a great history of public service. I remember, as a boy, camping on the Eden estate year after year when I was in the Church Lads' Brigade. So he was linked with the history of my own county; he was part of it.

His career began in dazzling fashion with a Military Cross in the First World War and a First in oriental languages at Oxford when the war was over. He then entered the Commons as the Member for Warwick and Leamington in 1923 and held the seat until his resignation in 1957. He made his name in the 1930s as a courageous and forceful diplomat acting as the champion of the League of Nations in a Europe increasingly beset by the dictatorial powers of Hitler, Mussolini and Franco. He argued and fought hard for disarmament and for peace, and he aroused the admiration of all of us by his policy stand on the Abyssinian war and in connection with Spain.

He tried to build up a framework of international obligations which would restrain the selfish interests of single nations. His opposition to appeasement, however, brought him into conflict with Chamberlain and led to his resignation in 1938 over negotiations with Mussolini. This act of courage, in resigning high office so early in his career, confirmed the reputation for sincerity and honour which he had gained, and marked him as a fitting companion for Winston Churchill in the dangerous years ahead.

He returned to office on the outbreak of war, and when Churchill formed his Coalition Government in 1940, Sir Anthony Eden was called to the War Cabinet, with the recognition that he was Churchill's heir-apparent should anything happen to the Prime Minister. Indeed, with his death we have lost the last surviving member of the War Cabinet, and this is our final opportunity to pay tribute to those brave and far-sighted men who supported Winston Churchill and led us successfully through the war.

The end of the war for him was marred by the death in action of his elder son, by his own illness and by his Government's defeat in the General Election of 1945. After a time in Opposition he returned to office in 1951, for his third spell as Foreign Secretary in the chilling atmosphere of the cold war. He now pursued policies aimed at reducing confrontation, relying on close association with America and using diplomatic skills to ease tension in Korea, Indo-China, Iran and elsewhere. He presided with great flair over the entry of West Germany to NATO, which was agreed at a Nine Power Conference under his chairmanship in 1954, and made a major contribution to the reconciliation between France and Germany.

Then in 1955 Churchill resigned and Eden succeeded him as Prime Minister. He began with a successful appeal to the country, and his Government were returned with an increased majority. But from this point on things went less well, and economic trouble at home coincided with disorder in Cyprus and the Middle East. Then President Nasser of Egypt nationalised the Suez Canal Company and there began the crisis which clouded the situation. I do not think it is useful to speculate whether the military action against Egypt, taken in opposition to American advice, was the decision of a sick man and out of character with his previous policies, or whether it was a determined response to aggression conceived in the history of the 'thirties and designed to prevent war from spreading across the world. I do know that I once listened to some of the Suez debates and shall never forget his moving dislike of war and his words when he spoke of what it meant to the ordinary soldier, looking back to the days when he was a young subaltern walking into a casualty unit. So all I would say here is that it is enough to lament the outcome of the crisis and the damage to Anthony Eden's health and reputation. In January 1957 on medical advice he resigned as Prime Minister and shortly after left the Commons.

It was not until 1961 that he accepted a Peerage and came to this House as Earl of Avon. For the rest of his life he was in poor health and, as a result, we in this House were not able to benefit from his wisdom as often as we should have liked. It is nevertheless with feelings of deep respect that we admire the achievements of his long career and his many virtues, which symbolised much of what is best in British public life. We lament his death, and I am sure that the whole House will want to join me in sending our most sincere sympathy to his widow and family on their tragic loss.

2.45 p.m.

Lord CARRINGTON

My Lords, I should like to associate those who sit on these Benches with the tribute which the noble Lord the Leader of the House has paid to Lord Avon and to echo his last words in sending our sympathy to his family. This is for us a sad occasion, but at the same time it is one when we can be thankful for the many public services that were given and for the example that was set in Lord Avon's long political and public life.

There are those in this House who are much more qualified to speak than I am, but to those of us who, even though we were very young, remember him as Foreign Secretary before the war, he always seemed to be a man destined to be the leader of his Party and of his country. His appearance, his charm, his ease of manner, coupled with his firm determination that the mistakes of 1914 should never again be repeated, were a guarantee that British foreign policy would be robust, sensible and forward-looking. I suppose it was his resignation, and that of Lord Salisbury, which did as much as anything to alert the British people to the dangers they were facing and to the problems with which they were very soon to be confronted. Most of us remember the reassurance that we felt when, once again, on the formation of Sir Winston Churchill's Government, he took high office in the Cabinet.

On television the other night there was shown an extract of a speech made by Lord Avon when in 1951 he once again became Foreign Secretary. It was a speech in which he set out his ideals and his policies for solving the international problems of that time; and a very impressive speech it was. No Foreign Secretary of today, of whatever Party, could speak with the assurance that he did or with the British influence and power that Lord Avon had behind him on that occasion. Indeed, it was his purpose to preserve and enhance that influence.

I do not believe, as some commentators have suggested, that Suez was the beginning of the decline of British influence: I think there are other reasons. But whatever may have been the views in your Lordships' House then and now about Suez, I have never heard one person impugn the motives of Lord Avon or the policies he pursued. They were, as always, honourable and straightforward. He believed, as passionately then as he did in the Second World War, in the sanctity of international obligations. His motives were patriotic, pragmatic and practical.

I am sure that to someone who hitherto had such success in his life some of the things that were said and written about him and Suez were deeply wounding; but in the 20 years that followed he never wavered in the belief that he was right or ever behaved in a way which was undignified or resentful. On the occasions when he came to your Lordships' House, when his health permitted him to do so, his speeches were, as one might have expected, full of the experience and wisdom he had accumulated over the years. We shall certainly be the poorer for not hearing him again. I noticed, in one of the obituaries which were written about him, that it was said that his qualities and character were of a different age. I wonder. It will be a sad day for this country when good manners, courtesy and kindness to your juniors, of whom I was proud to be one, are a thing of the past, and when courage and resolution and patriotism and public servile are no longer needed.

2.50 p.m.

Lord BYERS

My Lords, we on these Benches wish to be associated with the very well-deserved tributes which have been paid to our late colleague, the noble Earl, Lord Avon. In all the tributes of the past few days, two characteristics of the noble Earl are common to nearly all of them, and recur throughout. They are, as the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, said, courage and patriotism. They are qualities which all of us, no matter in what part of the political spectrum we may be, can recognise as being central to the personality and the motivations of the noble Earl. To my generation—that is, those of us who received our political baptism in the middle 'thirties—he epitomised the concern that we shared at the rise of the great dictators, and the determination to maintain the rule of international law against increasing odds in the immediate pre-war years. He was to many of us an inspiration which we needed, just as were Winston Churchill and, in my own Party, Sir Archibald Sinclair, all working so closely together after Eden's resignation, and thank God, my Lords, they did!

Whatever the verdict that history passes on later events, we shall never forget his courage and his insistence on putting country before Party in those crucial days, and those of us who served with him in the House of Commons immediately after the war remember not only his important contributions on international affairs, but his unfailing courtesy and kindness. Our sympathy today goes out to his widow, whose selfless devotion and care over the whole of their married life aroused the admiration of all those who witnessed it; and, of course, to the rest of the family.

2.52 p.m.

The LORD BISHOP of LONDON

My Lords, those who sit on the Bishops' Benches would wish to be associated with the tributes of admiration and affection which other noble Lords have paid to the memory of Lord Avon. Those of my age remember Lord Avon, or Anthony Eden as we familiarly knew him, as representing the beau ideal of the public servant. We knew that he belonged to that heroic generation which left school, when they were little more than boys, to be thrust into the holocaust of war on the Western Front, and which, at a time when they should have been growing up in normal circumstances, training themselves for their jobs and enjoying themselves, had to endure—in his case for three years—the miseries of war and the daily presence of death. That he came through that experience with his character unscathed is in itself a tribute to its strength. Later we were to recognise in him the symbol of resistance to the evil things which we saw growing in Europe and taking their grip upon men's hearts and minds.

Those of us who recollect the chill which gripped us as, one by one, the pointers revealed the shape of things to come—the Rhineland, Abyssinia, Spain—remember also our confidence that in Anthony Eden was a man who recognised what was going on, and was not prepared to compromise on the essential issues. His resignation in 1938 seemed to us to spell the inevitability of the catastrophe. We who were serving abroad during the war did not, of course, appreciate the immense demands made upon him, upon his time and physique, during that period. But we were home again to admire the long and loyal service that he gave as heir-apparent, and to applaud when he assumed the office of Prime Minister, for which he had had so long a training and which he so richly deserved. All the more tragic, therefore, were the brevity of his tenure of office and the circumstances of his leaving it.

It is still early days to make a proper assessment of the Suez crisis, but this at least can surely be said. Some—irresponsibly, I think—refer to the incident as the last attempt at gunboat diplomacy. From Lord Avon's words, and from our knowledge of his personality, we can be assured that for him such motives were far from the truth. As The Times obituary observed, he saw in the nationalisation of the Canal a challenge to international legality as flagrant and far-reaching as Hitler's reoccupation of the Rhineland. He knew the penalty we had paid for weakness then. He was determined that the reproach should not be repeated. Whatever other factors may have been involved, that surely was not an unworthy decision.

We who have cause to be grateful to Lord Avon for his leadership in the affairs of the nation also have cause to admire him for his bearing in the face of retirement and illness over a period of 20 years. It was good that he was well enough to attend your Lordships' House from time to time. Many of us remember the solemn warning he uttered in the debate in August 1968 on the rape of Czechoslovakia, when he described the stresses and strains which it created as being much graver than they had been at any time since the Second World War; or his words on the gracious Speech in March 1974—I think the last time he spoke in this House—when he stressed the importance of NATO and the duty of the Western World to feed and to help economically the emergent nations of the New World. During this time, we knew that he was upheld and cared for by the love and devotion of his wife, and to her the House extends its grateful respect and thanks.

The life of Lord Avon is a splendid example of a man endowed with great gifts of intellect, judgment and courage, who devoted all that he was, and all that he had, unsparingly and sacrificially to the welfare and prosperity of his country and of the world. He was a great patriot and a great public servant. May his be the reward that has been promised to faithful servants!

2.58 p.m.

Lord SELWYN-LLOYD

My Lords, I think this House will understand why I should wish to say something today. I did not know Anthony Eden before World War II, although I respected and admired him from afar. When the Conservatives won the 1951 Election and he returned to the Foreign Office, I was appointed Minister of State. I served him there for three years and it was the beginning of a lasting friendship. I will never forget when he came to the United Nations General Assembly in November 1951, then sitting in Paris because the building in New York was not finished, and, after a very long, arid cold war speech by Mr. Vyshinsky, Anthony Eden replied and a thrill went through the General Assembly—the Master had come back. Vyshinsky was completely isolated and next day he had to withdraw a good deal of what he had said.

Reference has been made here and elsewhere to the achievements of those years—the quite difficult negotiations over the Anglo-Iranian troubles, the Trieste problem, the restraining advice on Dien Bien Phu, the Indo-China settlement, the formation of the WEU and the bringing of Germany as an equal partner into the family of Western nations. They were all great achievements in the cause of peace.

It is alleged by some that he was unwilling to delegate; that he insisted on doing everything himself. That is quite untrue. Over negotiations with regard to the Korean armistice, over the handling of affairs at the United Nations, over disarmament, over, for example, the Sudan and certain aspects of the German problem, one was given very considerable freedom of action; and if it was not possible to do exactly what he wanted there was never any recrimination afterwards. There was complete support and total loyalty.

It is said by some that Lord Avon was a difficult man to work for. That also is quite untrue. He could be irritable at times over small matters—and who of us is not? Perhaps he did study Foreign Office telegrams too carefully for errors of style, but on big issues he was very calm and very ready to listen, to discuss, to reason and to ponder. Any idea that he made decisions—for example, in 1956—in a fit of impetuosity and without careful previous consideration is again quite untrue. There were hours and hours of careful discussion and careful weighing of the pros and cons. I agree so much with what has been said: that Lord Avon believed that he was right and that he retained the belief that he was right to the end of his life. He acted in the cause of peace, in the national interest to preserve the rule of law, and to try to see that international obligations were honoured and, as I say, he held that belief to the end of his life.

In the last 20 years I saw him regularly. He was a charming companion. He was deeply interested in contemporary events and always made very shrewd comments. But I never heard one word of self-pity, of feeling sorry for himself, complaining about his illnesses or about the end of his political career. It was a wonderful experience to see Lady Avon's devoted care, which without a doubt prolonged his life, and enhanced his enjoyment of it. Our thoughts are with her today. I mourn a dear friend whom I admired and loved. I think that the nation should mourn a great and gallant public servant.

3.4 p.m.

Lord SHINWELL

My Lords, as perhaps the oldest of our late colleague's contemporaries, may I have the privilege of associating myself with the eloquent and sincere tributes which have already been expressed by previous speakers. Whatever differences divide us, the sentiments which are very natural at this time are portrayed, and must be portrayed, by our unanimity.

It would be unseemly to revive the dying embers of past political events. This is certainly not the occasion for controversy about the Suez affair. The story no doubt will be told in full either remotely or perhaps in the foreseeable future, and when it is told it ought to be told objectively—without passion, without prejudice, without bias against individuals. It ought to be a statement of the facts which led up to that tragic event. All I would say about it is that although not a few members of the Party to which I belong were critical of our late colleague at that time, I—perhaps mistakenly, perhaps failing to understand the nature and content of what occurred—gave my support to him. I have never withdrawn a single word that I uttered on that occasion.

Anthony Eden was a brave man in his personal life. He showed such fortitude and courage, despite a recurring illness which pestered him for many years of his life. He was equally brave in public affairs. His resignation, which might have jeopardised his future, thus causing him to resign entirely from public life, was hailed by historians as an act of courage. I recall Anthony Eden for his charm and his remarkable courtesy. He was so approachable. I can hardly ever recall a really harsh word from him in the course of our disputations in another place. I do not believe that he ever felt harshness towards his political opponents. At any rate, although I frequently entered into disputation with him, I never felt that I was being sternly or harshly rebuked in his replies.

As regards his public life, I venture to express this opinion. We in this country have been favoured by some great Foreign Secretaries. We have one among us in this Assembly, and perhaps noble Lords will permit me to mention his name: Lord Home of the Hirsel. It is difficult to equal the person whom I have just mentioned in foreign affairs and foreign diplomacy but Anthony Eden could, in my judgment, equate the achievements of Lord Home of the Hirsel. He hated war, although he had shared in it with courage. He sought to promote peace, and if he failed it was not entirely his responsibility. In many respects he was a great statesman, a great Parliamentarian, a great comrade, a fine and outstanding colleague. Lastly, he was supported throughout many years of his life by a charming lady, devoted and faithful, who served him well. Now with his passing we mourn him. We shall revere his memory. We shall recall not his alleged mistakes and defects but his virtues, of which there were many.

3.9 p.m.

Lord HOME of the HIRSEL

My Lords, noble Lords have paid eloquent tributes to the life of Lord Avon who in his generation was widely and properly recognised as a most accomplished statesman. It is right that the Parliament of today should pause to remember his career. His apprenticeship to a life of duty started very early. Many of your Lordships will have read the very personal and characteristically modest little book which he wrote about his part in the 1914 war. No one who read that book could fail to mark his self-discipline, his courage and his loyalty, and if these values have fallen out of fashion his death reminds us of their essential virtue. That terrible war, and his experience of it, reinforced his ambition to oppose evil and to be an architect of peace; and the profession of politics, which he often used to tell me was not worth anything unless it was a public service, gave him a chance to reveal his particular personal talents as a conciliator and as a negotiator. He made no attempt whatever to sell his wares by oratory. On the contrary, his successes on the international stage were due to hard work, to exceptional application to detail and to perseverance.

I am glad that the noble Lord the Leader of the House and my noble friend Lord Selwyn-Lloyd referred to some of his positive achievements in the last two years of the war, in negotiation with the Russians over the Second Front; the handling of the critical situation which developed in Trieste and which could have led to another Balkan war; the reconciliation of Germany with the rest of the allies and with the United States of America in a pact for common defence; the settlement in 1954 of the troubles in Indo-China, which could so easily have led to a permanent peace, and of course his work for, first of all, the League of Nations, and then his part in the drafting of the Charter. There is nothing wrong with the Charter which Sir Anthony Eden at that time helped to draw up. He was in fact a peacemaker and it is as such that he should be remembered. I am glad too that the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, recalled the way he conducted foreign policy in the House of Commons at that time, for he was not interested in Party divisions. Quite the contrary: he tried to unite all Parties in the field of foreign affairs.

Many noble Lords have said that this is not the time to re-live the tense days of Suez, but even if those who write the story of those critical times continue to find against him—and I am by no means sure that they will—they will, if they are just, record that his actions sprang from his complete conviction that the sanctity of international treaties freely entered into is the sole foundation for world peace. That is a principle which our disorderly world finds is daily underlined.

Anyone who comes into the arena of politics can expect a rough time. One of the nicest characteristics of Lord Avon was that he could never grow a thick skin, and sensitivity took its toll. Nevertheless nothing can take away from the courage of the man, the principle of the man, the dedication to public service of the man. I believe that his life will be an inspiration to all those who have to try again and again and again to secure harmony of living between the nations of this world.

3.13 p.m.

Lord CACCIA

My Lords, noble Lords have spoken as colleagues and fellow Parliamentarians. May I be allowed to speak from these Benches from another angle as one who served Lord Avon over many years in various capacities from a junior Private Secretary to Undersecretary at home and ambassador abroad. What was far more to me was to be taken to heart from the first as a friend and to find how ready he was to share other interests beyond his tireless devotion to his work. It was not for nothing that he had obtained a first-class honours degree at Oxford nor that he liked to enjoy with others the good things of life from painting and architecture to food and wine to tennis and country pursuits. And laughter was never far away; never to the end of his life.

When I was appointed by him as one of his Private Secretaries, he had just become Secretary of State in the disarray following the Hoare-Laval proposals. This was no easy moment. But I wish I could convey to your Lordships the feeling of exhilaration of many at that time at the appointment of a young Secretary of State who would bring a new look to foreign affairs. This was not confined to the public alone. It was widely shared in the Foreign Office. How vividly I remember how he used to arrive early in the office with jottings on odd bits of paper with questions and ideas which he wished the Department to follow up. "You may find that they will be horrified", he would say with a smile, "but I would all the same like to know what is wrong with them and why". So much for the comment sometimes and so wrongly passed that he did not welcome the views of others. He did, and we tried to respond. Certainly he was mettlesome. But then he was a true thoroughbred and no placid hack. Critics have also said that he was not a natural orator. Perhaps so, But it should be remembered that you do not move the hearts and minds of men by rhetoric alone. It can equally be done by transparent integrity, courage and high purpose.

His period of office during the mounting threat of the dictators was not to last long. When he decided to resign it was for a basic principle. He held, and it is no bad principle at any time anywhere, that you should not embark on negotiations for new agreements with those holding power until existing commitments undertaken by them have been honoured.

His next notable period in office was as a leading member of Winston Churchill's war-time and post-war Administrations. This, as the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, has said, is not the time for any detailed analysis. Suffice it to say that it is no diminution of the greatness of Sir Winston Churchill to say that he owed a profound debt to the judgment, energy and skill of his Foreign Secretary. So did we. So did Europe and the Free World, for we were not then so inclined to denigrate our past or our actual performance. Nor were we obliged to concentrate cur whole effort on seeking temporary accommodation from our friends for livelihood itself. We then had the will, the confidence and the standing to undertake great enterprises, and it is surely misleading to make judgments as if the mood then was as it is now or to assert that our present low estimate of our capabilities will of necessity persist.

Indeed, when he became Prime Minister in 1955 we had just won through in Malaysia; we—and I mean largely he—had restored European cohesion after the collapse of the European Defence Committee; we—and again I mean he—had steered the Indo-China Conference on South-East Asia to an acceptable conclusion. All the same, memories of his Premiership are now clouded by Suez and I shall not now dilate on that. For the record, I will make only three bald statements about its inception, its course and its outcome. They are these. Anthony Eden did not occasion the action taken by Nasser when he nationalised the Canal. Then, over more than three months he sought with others and by all means short of war to find a way of preserving the Canal as an international right of way and thus of upholding the validity of international engagements. Lastly—and here I should rely on the generosity as well as sense of history of your Lordships—if these efforts failed, it is a travesty to suggest that the entire blame lay on Anthony Eden. We now have the testimony of Mr. Foster Dulles himself. In his last days in the Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, he talked at times of the events of his period as Secretary of State and said more than once how greatly he regretted the mistakes that he had made over Suez.

However that may be, if you go to war there is, as Field Marshal Montgomery said at the time, only one question. Did you win? Certainly the Israelis, we and the French won battles, but not the war. Anthony Eden accepted the consequences. It may be said that his health allowed him no other course. But he lived for 20 years more, and in his retirement he displayed, as has been said before by your Lordships, a fortitude of character that matched anything that had gone before. He did not wail nor complain. He was naturally and rightly determined to see, for the sake of his country as well as for himself, that the record, as he saw it, was kept straight. In all this he was helped by the devotion of Lady Avon. When they had married what wholly different prospects stretched before them. Her part in these years has been the wonder and won the affection and admiration of all who witnessed it.

My Lords, Cabinets before the last war used to be summoned in the time-honoured phrase that there would be a meeting of His Majesty's servants at such and such a time and on such and such a date. I do not know what the practice is now. But I do know that, if Her Majesty can continue to count on servants of the quality, character and courage of Anthony Eden, there is no reason that the next 25 years of her reign should not be happy and glorious. Surely, if he had been asked to express in any one sentence what ought to guide any British Minister, he, of all men, could have adopted the expression of Canning and said that, With every British Minister the interests of Britain ought to be the shibboleth of his policy".

3.22 p.m.

Lord DRUMALBYN

My Lords, I cannot speak with the authority of those who have held the highest offices. I cannot speak with the intimacy of those who have worked very closely indeed with Lord Avon. I cannot speak with the eloquence of all the speakers who have spoken so far in this debate. But, very humbly, on behalf of noble Lords on the Back-Benches who belong to the Party to which Lord Avon belonged and of which he became the Leader, I venture to try to express our esteem for him, which went far beyond respect and for many of us amounted to affection, an affection which was not diminished, and indeed may even have been enhanced, by the fact that not all his endeavours on behalf of the land he loved were crowned by success.

For my part, I never knew him well. Quite simply, I looked up to him from the bottom rung of the ladder—on which he placed my feet—and admired him at the top of it. There was a gallantry that distinguished all of his life. The generation to which I belong will never forget his staunch refusal to yield to the bully, however superior in strength. We remember particularly the example he set to us all when he gave up the high office of Foreign Secretary and emphasised his determination to serve his country by immediately going back to his territorial regiment in 1938.

That he was a man of peace he showed by his devotion to the League of Nations, and later by the part he played at San Francisco, when, as the noble Lord, Lord Home, has said, he led the British Delegation at the Conference which established the Charter of the United Nations. But no one knew better than he that peace could not be maintained by pious declarations alone. Perhaps his greatest contribution to our times was the initiative he took in 1954, referred to by many previous speakers, in bringing about the London Conference of nine nations, including Germany and Italy, which resulted in the enlarged Brussels Treaty at a time when the co-operation for defence of the West had been placed in grave jeopardy, and statesmen in the United States of America were talking of "agonising reappraisal".

My noble friend Lord Blake has a ptly written of his courage, high principles, integrity and profound knowledge of foreign affairs. The noble Earl, Lord Longford, has described him as a man whose whole strength was drawn from his ability to unite. These qualities, coupled with great natural charm and dogged patience in negotiation, combined to make him one of the greatest of our Foreign Secretaries, a statesman who was constantly seeking to promote mutual understanding and to reach the highest measure of agreement practical, whether at home or abroad, without abandonment of principle. He was a man who won the admiration of friend and opponent alike, and particularly, I think, of the younger generation. He was indeed a practical idealist. He looked for a world in which not only nations but individuals would work together for the common good, helping, not harming, each other, seeking wider individual freedom through the old-fashioned virtues of diligence, thrift, self-reliance and neighbourliness. My Lords, to quote a great phrase, it is with proud thanksgiving that I pay my humble tribute, and join with your Lordships in expressing my deep sympathy to his devoted widow and family.

3.27 p.m.

Baroness WARD of NORTH TYNE-SIDE

My Lords, I am proud to take part in these tributes to Lord Avon. He came from the North-East coast and on behalf of the North-East coast I felt that I should like to make my own small tribute. Anthony was a friend of mine long before either he or I arrived in the House of Commons, and, irrespective of Party interests, the whole of the North always had great pride in the contribution made by Anthony during the many years that he contributed to the welfare of our country. There is just one point which I should rather like to make, because it appears to have been hardly referred to in all the comments which have been made since Anthony's death; that is, that when Ernest Bevin became Foreign Secretary—and a very remarkable Foreign Secretary he was—he used to consult Anthony, because he realised the wisdom and the knowledge which he could obtain by his discussions with Anthony. I think it is a great tribute when anyone who succeeds realises that his predecessor has very much to offer. Of course, we in the North have always been proud that Anthony came from our part of the world and served the nation so well.

When, after many decades have passed, the history of these times comes to be written by historians who discuss in detail the pros and cons of all the Foreign Secretaries, I feel that Anthony Eden will be at the top as one of the greatest Foreign Secretaries that this country has ever had. When one thinks of the phrase. "peace in our time", which in these very difficult years one really does wonder about, one feels that if we can ever achieve peace in our time throughout the world, which is our objective, nobody will have played a greater part than Anthony Eden. That I hope, and I am sure, history will always remember.

3.30 p.m.

Viscount AMORY

My Lords, I hope that your Lordships will forgive a not very important Member of your House for seeking to add one personal mite of tribute to the splendid tributes that have already been paid. I shall always feel immensely fortunate in having known Anthony Eden over many years. I knew him a little at school and a good deal better at university, and then I met him again much later, in politics. The qualities which will always stand out in my mind are those that have already been so well referred to; namely, courage, absolute integrity and a deep and utterly unselfish patriotism.

It is easy for us, after all this time, to forget the intense admiration and prestige that Anthony Eden's brilliant work during an absolutely crucial period of our history attracted for Britain throughout the world, how invaluable those services were to our country and how dedicated they were to the cause of peace. The lesson which was burnt into his mind above all cithers that stemmed from those days was the insidious danger of appeasement of the forces of tyranny.

My Lords, as one of the surviving members of his Cabinet, I pay tribute to his memory and to the courage with which he faced his increasing ill-health while carrying the immense burdens of responsibility which were inseparable from his position as Prime Minister. As a young man he had proved himself a gallant and devoted officer. As Prime Minister if a colleague was faced with an unpopular measure, Anthony Eden's instinct was how to draw the fire on himself and shoulder the burden.

During the long years when he suffered ill-health, how devoted was the care and love given to him by Lady Avon. So long as courage, integrity and honour are valued as the highest qualities in human life, Anthony Eden's place in our national history will be assured.

3.35 p.m.

Lord SLATER

My Lords, as an ordinary Back-Bencher I have sat and listened to the tributes that have been paid to this great man, this great politician whom we have lost. He is a great loss to your Lordships' House. I knew Anthony Eden personally because his home and his family's estate, where he used to spend his boyhood days, was in the constituency which I represented when I was in the other place. I often talked with him in the other place about the various visits which he made to his home when his mother was very active within the county of Durham.

We who come from the county of Durham are very proud that such a character as Anthony Eden should come from our county. The great love and affection that has been bestowed on his memory today will go down in history as being among the greatest tributes that have ever been paid to any person who has been engaged in political life. I believe that many of the qualities that embraced the life of Anthony Eden emanated from the good lady, his mother, Lady Sybil Eden. There is a memorial hospital called the Lady Sybil Memorial Hospital, and it does valuable voluntary work.

Anthony Eden was a friend to anyone, no matter who they were or upon which side of the House they chose to sit. Anyone could enter into conversation with him. I remember one particular occasion when I spoke to him in the Strangers' Restaurant in the other place. He had been suffering from that dreaded complaint called jaundice. He said to me, "Joe, have you ever had jaundice?" I said, "No, it has not been my privilege to have that." He said, "It is a horrible complaint." I said, "My girlie had it and I can appreciate your views on it." On that particular occasion he was in the company of another noble Lord, one who is not here today but who came from the other place having given great service to the other place at that time as Minister of Agriculture.

We have much to be proud of, whatever our Party. We can entirely disagree with each other in cut and thrust in the order of debate, but it should never interfere with our friendship for each other. I am most grateful for the friends that I have made since coming to this House, although one poor Peer was led to believe that, because I am limited by certain defects in my make-up, I was a Communist. Anyone who believes that about Joe Slater will believe anything, because I could not have been so regarded by Hugh Gaitskell or Harold Wilson, both of whom I served. I should like to have served Anthony Eden because of his integrity, his standing, his eloquence and the lessons that one was able to learn when he stood at the Dispatch Box and dealt with foreign affairs.

Some noble Lords may remember me saying that there are many potential Foreign Secretaries in this place, as indeed there are in the other place. However, in my opinion Lord Avon will go down in history as one of the greatest ambassadors that this country has ever produced in the political arena, as one who tried to bring peace throughout the world by his great efforts in that arena.

3.38 p.m.

Lord CARR of HADLEY

My Lords, very briefly, and with great diffidence, I should like not to repeat but to add something new to what has been said about Lord Avon. Naturally and properly, our tributes to him today have concentrated on his almost unique record in the field of service in foreign policy. However, to men and women of my generation he was not only a bright light in that field; he also stood out as a bright light in his approach to politics generally and to domestic politics in particular.

I had the honour to be his Parliamentary Private Secretary for four and a half years. Last week someone said to me, "Why did he pick you out? You did not know anything in particular about foreign affairs." I said, "No, that was the point." I happened to have the chance to make my maiden speech in another place on a subject which today we would describe as industrial democracy. I had no idea that he was interested in that subject, but after I had made my speech he asked to talk to me. I found out that in domestic politics this was his chief motivating interest.

He believed in the capitalist system not only as the best means of producing the maximum wealth for our country but also as an essential safeguard for our freedom. But he felt that, as developed until then, it had treated the great majority of people who worked in industry far too much as "hands" and far too little as individual, human people. So his great concern was with thoughts of joint consultation, the sharing of information, of decision-taking, of partnership. He kept using the phrase "A property-owning democracy". Although that was largely thought of in terms of home-ownership, in his mind the really important part of it was the ownership of responsibility, the sense of ownership of one's job, of proper dignity and satisfaction in one's work. That was what he meant to be the domestic theme of his Premiership which, alas!, was overtaken first by economic problems, then by his recurrent illness, and then by the tragedies of foreign affairs.

I do not think that anybody will know and appreciate his farsightedness unless also understanding that that was his motivating theme so far as domestic policy was concerned. It marked him out again in this area as a man of intense humanity. It was my experience with him to which I owe anything I have been able to do in public life, and the way I have been able to do it. Anybody who knew him as it was my privilege to know him will know of his humanity and warmth, and know that such a person can think of him only with great affection. When I think of him in the future I shall do so not only with affection but also with another quality in mind—that of gaiety. Nobody who knew him well could ever be with him for long without feeling that life was indeed worth living.

Lord PEART

My Lords, I beg to move that, as a mark of respect to the memory of the late Lord Avon, the House do now adjourn.

Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to nemine dissentiente.