Nigel Lawson dies: The life of Thatcher’s chancellor, from political clashes to the Big Boom and climate scepticism
Nigel Lawson, chancellor to Margaret Thatcher, has died at the age of 91.
He leaves behind five of his six children, including TV chef Nigella Lawson and journalist Dominic Lawson. One of his daughters, Thomasina, died aged 32.
Born in Hampstead, northwest London, on 11 March 1932, the son of the owner of a tea-trading firm climbed his way to the top of British politics after an education at Westminster School and Oxford University.
His political life started at Oxford, where he did Philosophy, Politics and Economics – like many other politicians – but he began his working life carrying out national service as a Royal Navy officer.
Lord Lawson, as he was to become, then became a financial journalist, writing for the Financial Times and The Sunday Telegraph, before becoming editor of The Spectator.
After 14 years as a journalist, in 1970 he stood to become an MP, unsuccessfully, for the Eton and Slough seat before eventually winning the now-defunct Leicestershire constituency of Blaby four years later.
When the Conservatives won the election in 1979 under Mrs Thatcher, she made him financial secretary to the Treasury and her policies at the time clearly reflected his influence.
She then promoted him to energy secretary, where he helped prepare for what he called “inevitable” full-scale strikes in the coal industry, which had been nationalised by Labour prime minister Clement Attlee.
But it was as chancellor that Mr Lawson ensured he would go down in the history books.
Margaret Thatcher’s cabinet in 1983. Nigel Lawson is sitting third from the left
Tax cuts, the Big Bang and the Lawson Boom
The second longest-serving chancellor after Gordon Brown, Mr Lawson was key to Mrs Thatcher’s economic policies – and success.
After getting the job in 1983 he pushed ahead with tax reforms, reducing corporation taxes and lowering National Insurance contributions for the lower-paid, while extending the VAT base.
From 1986, his public image grew after he reduced the standard rate of personal income tax and unemployment began to fall.
He also managed to turn around government finances from a budget deficit of £10.5bn in 1983 to a surplus of £3.9bn in 1988 and £4.1bn in 1989.
However, the government’s current account deficit increased from below 1% GDP to almost 5% in three years.
Mr Lawson managed to honour his promise to bring taxation rates down, with the basic rate going from 30% to 25%, and the top tax rate from 60% to 40%. He also removed other higher rates so nobody paid above 40% in personal tax.
One of his major triumphs was the Big Bang of 1986, which saw the City’s financial markets deregulated and London strengthened as a financial capital – but in 2010, he admitted the “unintended consequence” of that was the 2007 financial crisis.
He even had a period of economic growth named after him. The Lawson Boom saw the UK economy on the up after 1986, with unemployment halved.
However, that led to a rise in inflation to 8% in 1988 and interest rates doubled to 15% within 18 months, with critics accusing Mr Lawson of unleashing an inflationary spiral due to his policies.
In his 1992 memoir, written just after he stepped down as an MP, Mr Lawson admitted the 1987 manifesto was not properly thought through and if it had not been for the economic growth, the manifesto would have been a disaster.
“As it was, it was merely an embarrassment,” he said.
Mr Lawson with a battered red Budget Box in 1987
Clashes with Thatcher
While he was Mrs Thatcher’s right-hand man, the pair did not always see eye-to-eye and he was overruled in cabinet when he opposed introducing a poll tax to replace local government financing.
There was also the now-infamous 1988 budget, which took nearly two hours for Mr Lawson to announce as there were continuous interruptions and protests from opposition parties.
The then-depute leader of the Scottish National Party, Alex Salmond, was suspended from the Commons for his constant interruptions and MPs voted against amending the law bill.
Nigel Lawson with Margaret Thatcher at the 1989 Conservative Party Conference
Mrs Thatcher and her chancellor also clashed over the exchange-rate mechanism (ERM) membership in 1985, with Mr Lawson – ironically, as he became a Brexiteer – believing membership was the only way forward to help convince the markets the UK was committed to fiscal discipline.
It proved to be one of Mrs Thatcher’s most tumultuous meetings with her senior ministers as she single-handedly faced them down after Mr Lawson had spoken separately to all of the ministers present to persuade them to ambush her.
Mr Lawson later said he had considered resigning after she said their arguments did not convince her, but he was dissuaded by colleagues. Mrs Thatcher was persuaded to sign up to the ERM five years later by Mr Lawson’s successor, John Major.
The prime minister’s relationship with her chancellor took another dive when she re-employed economist Alan Walters in 1989 as her personal economic adviser, with Mr Lawson at loggerheads with them over the ERM.
He threatened to resign if Mrs Thatcher did not sack Mr Walters over his support of the ERM. Mrs Thatcher wrote in a private memo that was “absurd” and urged him to rethink – and Mr Lawson quit.
National Archive files released in 2017 revealed the extent Mr Walters was briefing against Mr Lawson, including telling Mrs Thatcher that Mr Lawson’s position over the ERM was having a devastating impact on the UK economy.
Mr Lawson’s resignation was seen as the beginning of the end for Mrs Thatcher, with her foreign secretary Geoffrey Howe resigning shortly after – and Mrs Thatcher resigned in 1990 after Michael Heseltine decided to challenge her for leadership of the Conservative Party.
Post-Thatcher
Mr Lawson remained as a backbencher until 1992, when he was elevated to the House of Lords with a life peerage, and was known as Lord Lawson of Blaby.
Months after he stood down as an MP, he lost five stone after his doctor told him his knee problems would not stop if he continued to carry the weight.
It dramatically changed his appearance and he published The Nigel Lawson Diet Book, which became a best seller.
Previously 17 stone and 5ft 9, he had been an easy target for political cartoonists – although it did not bother him – and he admitted after losing weight: “I was certainly a fat man.
“It came up gradually, and by the time I was chancellor, certainly, that was the thing the cartoonists seized on; that was part of the image – no doubt about it.”
Mr Lawson used his time away from the Commons to occasionally appear as a guest on daughter Nigella’s cookery shows.
He also served on the advisory board of the Conservative magazine Standpoint.
Two wives, six children
Mr Lawson was married twice. His first wife was former ballet dancer Vanessa Salmon with whom he had Dominic (the journalist), Thomasina (who died of breast cancer aged 32), Nigella (the TV chef) and Horatia. After they divorced, Ms Salmon died of liver cancer aged 48.
His second wife was former Commons researcher Therese Maclear, who he married the same year he divorced Ms Salmon. They had son Tom and daughter Emily before they divorced in 2008.
Nigel Lawson with his TV chef daughter Nigella Lawson in 2008
In 2011, he found love again at the age of 79 with 42-year-old Dr Tina Jennings, a former banker who was previously married to New Zealand’s richest man.
However, they split up two years later, with Dr Jennings reportedly finding it hard to go regularly to France, which Mr Lawson did every weekend.
Controversial support for Brexit
In 2009, Mr Lawson was caught up in the parliamentary expenses scandal after he was accused of claiming £16,000 in overnight allowances by registering his farmhouse in Gascony, southwest France, as his main residence.
In 2013, the former chancellor pushed for the UK to leave the EU and ahead of the 2016 referendum he was appointed chairman of the Vote Leave campaign.
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Nigel Lawson on George Osborne’s 2016 Autumn Statement
At the time, he was living in France and in 2018 started to apply for his official French residency card.
His critics accused him of hypocrisy for living in France yet campaigning for the UK to leave the EU, but he said he did not believe the issue of Britons living in other EU countries was a big problem in the Brexit negotiations.
In 2019, Mr Lawson returned to live in the UK after putting his Gascony mansion on the market. He said it was to be close to his children and grandchildren.
Climate scepticism
In opposition to Mrs Thatcher, who helped put climate change on the agenda, Mr Lawson was very sceptical of the concept and denied global warming is taking place to such a large degree as many scientists say.
He wrote a letter in 2004 criticising the Kyoto Protocol and claiming there were substantial scientific uncertainties.
As a member of the House of Lords Economics Affairs Select Committee, he carried out an inquiry into climate change in 2005 and recommended the Treasury take a more active role in climate policy.
The report said there was a mismatch between the economic costs and the benefits of climate policy – which kicked off a tussle between him and Michael Grubb, chief economist of the Carbon Trust.
He contributed to the 2007 documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle and in 2008 published a book called An Appeal to Reason: A Cool Look at Global Warming.
In the book, he admitted global warming is happening and will have negative consequences but said the impact of those changes will be moderate rather than apocalyptic, and criticised “alarmist” politicians and scientists.
He was heavily denounced by climate scientists and the UK’s chief scientific adviser at the time, Sir John Beddington, who privately told Mr Lawson he had “incorrect” and “misleading” claims in the book.
But that did not stop him airing his views, and in 2009 he launched a new thinktank called The Global Warming Policy Foundation.
His journalist son, Dominic Lawson, is also a climate change sceptic.
Victims of maternity failings say they’re “disappointed” with the findings of an interim report which they fear will have “no teeth” to make changes.
An investigation into NHS maternity services is under way after a series of shocking scandals.
The National Maternity and Neonatal Investigation (NMNI) is being led by Baroness Amos, who said “nothing prepared her” for the amount of “unacceptable care” families currently receive.
A report has been released documenting her initial reflections and impressions after meeting families and visiting hospitals.
She will investigate 12 NHS trusts in total, including Oxford University Hospitals (OUH), which runs the world-renowned John Radcliffe Hospital.
‘I was left in my own blood’
Rebecca Matthews formed a campaign for families failed by OUH after her own traumatic births.
Asked to discuss the care she received, she said she “could only describe it as callous”.
“There wasn’t any kindness there. I was left in my own blood,” she added.
Ms Matthews recently took part in evidence-gathering sessions held by Baroness Amos.
But when she read her interim report, she said it was “disappointing”, as it appeared to be “a bullet point list of failings that actually we’ve seen time and time again in independent reviews”.
“The reflections don’t mention accountability at all,” she said.
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Birth trauma: Your stories
‘Why are we struggling to provide?’
Based on her initial inquiries, Baroness Amos found common themes, including women not being listened to and being “disregarded” when they raised concerns.
Many weren’t given the right information to make informed choices about their care.
She was told of discrimination against women of colour, working-class mothers, or parents who were younger.
A “staggering” 748 recommendations have been made about NHS maternity services in recent years, Baroness Amos revealed – and she does “not understand why change has been so slow”.
She asked: “Why are we in England still struggling to provide safe, reliable maternity and neonatal care everywhere in the country?”
Baroness Valerie Amos. Pic: Reuters
The most recent health watchdog findings paint a depressing picture of maternity services.
Almost two-thirds of acute hospital maternity services were judged either inadequate or required improvement for safety.
Read more from Sky News:
Three women describe traumatic childbirth
This investigation is long overdue and isn’t due to report back fully until the spring.
But some campaigners are already worried it won’t bring meaningful change to maternity services.
Ms Matthews said it “seems as though it’s heading the same way that other reviews have gone in the past, leading to some recommendations but no teeth”.
“We need some mechanisms that are going to hold people and systems to account,” she said.
‘More to do’
OUH chief nurse Yvonne Christley said in a statement that “feedback received from patients using our maternity service over the last year is positive overall”.
“However, we know we have more to do to improve our maternity services,” she added.
“Our present focus is on listening to the experiences of women and families, which is helping us to identify opportunities for improvement.”
Anyone feeling emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the US, call the Samaritans branch in your area or 1 (800) 273-TALK.
The head of the Royal Navy has warned the government to “step up” and fund defence or risk losing the UK’s superiority in the Atlantic to Russia.
Should that happen, General Sir Gwyn Jenkins said it would be the first time since the end of the Second World War that Britain’s warships and submarines were not the dominant force in their most vital sea lanes alongside their allies.
“We are holding on, but not by much,” he told a conference in London on Monday.
“There is no room for complacency. Our would-be opponents are investing billions. We have to step up, or we will lose that advantage.”
As a senior, serving military officer speaking publicly, he did not make any direct criticism of the speed of plans by Sir Keir Starmer’s government to increase defence spending.
But Sky News has reported that he and his fellow chiefs held a “very difficult meeting” last month over how to fund plans to rebuild the armed forces amid fears of further cuts.
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Budget: what about defence spending?
Defence sources said there was growing concern at the very top of the armed forces about a gap between the promises being made by the prime minister to fix the UK’s hollowed-out defences and the reality of the size of the defence budget, which is currently not seen as growing fast enough.
That means either billions of additional pounds must be found more quickly, or ambitions to modernise and transform the armed forces might need to be curbed, despite warnings of mounting threats from Russia and China, and pressure from Donald Trump on allies to spend more on their own defences.
A Sky News and Tortoise podcast series called The Wargame tracks the hollowing out of the UK’s military since the end of the Cold War and the risk that has created.
👉Search for The Wargame on your podcast app👈
General Jenkins, the first Royal Marine to serve as First Sea Lord, used a speech at the Sea Power Conference to say that Russia is still investing billions in its naval capabilities – in particular the Northern Fleet that operates in the Atlantic – even as it wages war against Ukraine.
There has been a 30% increase in Russian incursions in the North Atlantic in the past two years, he said.
That included the Yantar spy ship, which last month was spotted off the coast of Scotland and even shone a laser at the pilots of a Royal Air Force reconnaissance plane that was tracking the vessel.
The Russian spy ship Yantar. Pic: MOD/PA
Yet General Jenkins said what Russia is doing beneath the surface of the waves, where the UK and its allies store vital communications cables as well as critical oil and gas pipelines, was even more concerning.
“I can also tell you today that the advantage that we have enjoyed in the Atlantic since the end of the Second World War is at risk,” he said.
Read more:
UK unveils undersea tech
Does Britain’s threat to Russia ring hollow?
HMS Iron Duke shadowing the Russian Frigate Neustrashimy through UK waters in September. Pic: PA
Navy facing huge challenges
It is a particularly tough time for the navy, which has more ships and submarines alongside and unable to operate than at sea or at least ready to sail.
The service is also suffering from a shortage of sailors and in particular submariners, which again is impacting the availability of the fleet.
The crisis follows decades of funding cuts since the end of the Cold War, compounded by a litany of botched procurement programmes that has all too often seen vessels coming into service years late, at an inflated price and in too few numbers.
Vision of ‘hybrid navy’
Despite the sombre tone, the First Sea Lord set out how he wants to transform his service and make it ready to fight a war – though not until 2029, a timeline that could be too slow if some predictions about the threat posed by Russia to NATO are correct.
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New UK military technology unveiled
His vision – working with industry and other allies – is about developing a blend of manned ships and submarines as well as unmanned ones – a “hybrid navy”.
He is also stripping back what he called the navy’s own bureaucracies to enable the service to move much faster – crucially at the pace of the threat and the pace of rapid and growing technological change.
“We will face headwinds, we will face rough seas, but together, we can solve these problems if we have the appetite, if we have the determination, and if we have the mindset.”
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