Freedom of the Borough honour for a gay pioneer Lord Smith of Finsbury

Published: 19 November, 2010
by TERRY MESSENGER

ISLINGTON’S gay Lib Dem group leader Councillor Terry Stacy this week warmly thanked Labour’s Lord Smith of Finsbury for being the first MP to “step out of the closet”.

Lord Smith paved the way for other gay people in public life to be open about their sexuality, Cllr Stacy said.

He paid a warm tribute to his political opponent at a ceremony to confer the Freedom of the Borough on Lord Smith, the first openly gay MP.

Colonel Brian Kay, the Queen’s representative in the borough, and Roman Catholic priest Father Jim Kennedy were also invested as Freemen of the Borough on Tuesday.

Casting political differences aside, Cllr Stacy said: “One of the major influences on my life and many other young gay men’s lives was Chris Smith’s coming out in 1984.    

“At the time we lacked any positive gay role models in the media, let alone in politics. And that event in my view was truly historic.”

With Lord Smith sitting just a few feet away at the investiture in Islington town hall, Cllr Stacy told him: “Stepping out of the closet and standing up and being counted was what he did.   

“It was easier for us who followed in politics to be able to create a career and I thank you personally for doing that.”

It was a generous gesture given the long and bitter conflict between Labour and the Lib Dems in Islington.

Lord Smith helped finish off the Lib Dems’ predecessor party, the SDP, in the borough when he captured Islington South and Finsbury from Social Democrat George Cunningham at the 1983 general election. And Cllr Stacy was deposed as Islington Council leader when Labour took control at May’s local elections.

Lord Smith ‘came out’ in 1984 and became the first openly gay Cabinet minister anywhere in the world when he was made Culture Secretary in Tony Blair’s newly- elected government in 1997.

Before becoming an MP, he represented Barnsbury ward as a councillor. After stepping down as an MP in 2005, he was elevated to the Lords.

Labour council leader Councillor Catherine West thanked him for allowing free entry to museums when he was Culture Secretary.

She said: “Many a parent who has faced a wet afternoon in a February half-term has thought: What on earth am I going to do with these children? And you’d turn up at a museum or gallery and it was free and you could use that money for an ice cream and you’d think: God bless Chris Smith.”

And, referring to Lord Smith’s membership of socialist mountaineering club Red Rope, Islington North Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn praised his ability to reach agreement with political opponents. He said: “I was always impressed by the fact that Red Rope included the Workers Revolutionary Party, the Socialist Workers Party and the Labour Party. How you ever agreed on the knots I don’t know.”

A packed council chamber gave the biggest cheer of the night to Mr Corbyn’s tribute to the ex-Cabinet minister’s opposition to the Iraq war.

He quoted from a speech, given by Lord Smith after he returned to the backbenches, in which he warned against an invasion.

Tributes were paid to all the new Freemen, who received an honour dating back to the Middle Ages which, according to jokes cracked by speakers, allows them to graze their animals on the public highway.

Mr Corbyn warmly praised Colonel Kay, ex-commanding officer of the Honourable Artillery Company, headquartered in City Road, Finsbury – the oldest regiment in the British Army.

Mr Corbyn told him: “When you are driving those sheep along the Holloway Road, they are going to be the best ordered sheep. They are all going to be in line and they are probably even going to stop and take a salute at Highbury Corner.”

Colonel Kay was honoured for voluntary work in the borough, notably helping with the scouting movement and military cadets – and for being chairman of Islington Chinese Association, a role stemming from his Army days in the Far East. 

Father Kennedy, ex-parish priest at Blessed Sacrament Church, in Copenhagen Street, Islington, was praised for nearly 30 years’ service to the community, which included the provision of a refuge for survivors of the King’s Cross station fire in 1987. 

He was absent from the ceremony but thanked the council in a video filmed at his new posting in Cyprus, where he is preparing for a Papal visit.