Denis Healey

Denis Healy, an important Labour politician, died this week at the age of 98. He was never Prime Minister, but he was Chancellor of the Exchequer in the 1970s and was very well known indeed.

Here is his obituary in The Guardian newspaper. Of course, it is traditional to write mostly positive things about leading figures when they die, and one must remember that the author of this obituary is generally in agreement with Healey's view of what the Labour party should be (considerably to the right of the present Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn). Still, the article explains a number of things, and the role of Healey in some of the main political debates of the 1960s and 1970s. If you understand every reference, you are very well informed indeed on recent British history.