The Domino Plan: Introducing Storm English PDF
Preview The Domino Plan: Introducing Storm English
LORD GRANVILLE of Eye was the oldest member of the House of Lords and one of the last surviving members of the 1929 parliamentary intake. Although the reference books had recorded his birthday as 12 February 1899 it became clear recently that he was in fact born the previous year, and he died two days after celebrating his 100th birthday.
In 1967 he was raised to the Lords by Harold Wilson, and initially sat as a Labour peer before becoming a cross-bencher during the 1970s. Although his recreations were listed as football, cricket and ski-ing, Granville was also the author of two political thrillers, Storm English (1972) and The Domino Plan (1975).
There is a civilised custom whereby peers who have once been members of the House of Commons can wander into the members' cafeteria at will, writes Tam Dalyell. Almost daily, the first to be served was usually a squat man whom no MP could remember as a parliamentary colleague. This was hardly surprising, since Edgar Granville had lost his seat in 1951.
Our friendship began in 1968 when Harold Wilson, who remembered Granville as a loyal colleague supporting the Attlee government, sent him to the Lords. Granville sat down next to me and the first words he spoke were: "I stayed with your mum and dad in Bahrain in 1934 when I was Sir John Simon's parliamentary private secretary. Your dad was a stickler for imperial protocol, but your Arabic-speaking mum, with her cine-camera and friendships with Bahraini women fascinated us." Granville was a man with a sense of curiosity which led to shrewd and accurate judgements.
What really brought us together was Gallipoli, where my maternal grandfather had been severely wounded and many killed in his regiment, the King's Own Scottish Borderers. Granville described the circumstances of Anzac Cove, and the ludicrous night charge in which so many Australians, New Zealanders and British perished. His one source of pride was his presidency of the
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