Labour MP Sir Stuart Bell dies after battle with cancer

Published on 14/10/2012 01:47

SENIOR Labour backbencher Sir Stuart Bell died yesterday after a short battle with 
pancreatic cancer.

The 74-year-old politician had been MP for Middlesbrough for nearly three 
decades, and served in key
positions in Parliament.

Bell was the son of a Durham miner, and after a 
grammar school education was briefly a colliery clerk and newspaper reporter before
becoming a barrister.

Having lived and worked in Paris for a spell, he returned in 1977 to pursue a career in politics. He unsuccessfully contested Hexham in 1979, and was a member of Newcastle City Council until he won Middlesbrough in 1983. He went on to hold the seat through seven general elections.

While never serving as a minister, Bell was the party’s Northern Ireland spokesman during the 1980s. Later in his career, he was handed a powerful role on the Commons Commission – the body resp­onsible for running the House.

He played a central role ­during one of Parliament’s most difficult periods as the long-running scandal of MPs’ expenses abuses finally emerged in 2009.

Bell, who was married with one son, was knighted in 2004 for “services to Parliament” and was also awarded the ­Legion d’Honneur in 2006 for his contributions to British-French relations.

A published novelist as well as the writer of several political works, his role as an MP saw him finally reach the Commons, where as a young man he had dreamed of working for the official record, Hansard.

Among his political missions was to secure voting reform, leading Labour campaigns for a switch to the Alternative Vote – but he was an active
opponent of the party’s prop­osals to replace the Lords with a senate.

Labour’s former Europe minister Chris Bryant paid tribute to the “ardent and intelligent pro-European Labour MP” as parliamentary colleagues registered their sorrow at his death via Twitter.

Ian Swales, Liberal Democrat MP for Redcar, wrote: “Very sad to hear of the death of Stuart Bell MP. Always a 
total gentleman to me.”