Roy Hattersley: Labour politician who helped start the party's modernisation

Roy Hattersley: Labour politician who helped start the party's modernisation9 minutes agoShareSaveAdd as preferred on GoogleSam WoodhouseGetty ImagesRoy Hattersley, who has died at the age of 93, was one of Labour's cleverest and most articulate post war politicians.But he was fated to spend more than two-thirds of his career in opposition, and only briefly achieved cabinet rank.A moderniser before the term was invented, he vigorously opposed Labour's shift to the left after Margaret Thatcher's victory in 1979.As Neil Kinnock's deputy leader in the 1980s, he encouraged his party to embrace multilateral disarmament, the market economy and the European Union.As a result, they saw off the challenge of the SDP and laid the foundations for New Labour which, eventually, resulted in the 1997 Blair landslide.Getty ImagesCampaigning to be the MP for Birmingham Sparkbrook in 1963Roy Sydney George Hattersley was born in Sheffield on 28 December 1932, into a family steeped in Labour history.His mother, Enid, who served a term as the city's Lord Mayor, described herself as being born into the party.His father, also called Roy, shared her political drive. He had once been a Catholic priest - before quitting the church to run off with Enid, two weeks after he'd married her to someone else.Young Roy was a political campaigner in his early teens, delivering leaflets and knocking on doors in support of local councillors and parliamentary candidates.He won a scholarship to Sheffield Grammar School before going to the University of Hull to read economics, following a friend's suggestion that it was an essential subject for any budding politician.Getty ImagesRoy Hattersley fought bitter struggles with the Labour left over nuclear disarmament, the market economy and EuropeOn leaving Hull, he worked briefly in a Sheffield steel mill and spent two years teaching in further education.In 1956, he was elected to Sheffield City Council, and served, for a...