UNITED KINGDOM
The Independent
PAUL PEACHEY Thursday 22 January 2015
The Prime Minister has led tributes to Lord Brittan, the former Home Secretary, whose retirement after years of public service has been dogged by controversy over the alleged cover-up of child abuse on his watch.
The death of Lord Brittan, at the age of 75 from cancer, was greeted with sorrow by his family and the admiration of his political peers, but with disappointment from abuse victims’ groups seeking answers about an alleged establishment paedophile ring.
As the youngest Home Secretary since Winston Churchill, Lord Brittan was a key member of Cabinet after the Conservative landslide of 1983 swept Margaret Thatcher back to power.
He was a central figure in the controversy over the policing of the miners’ strike and the Libyan embassy siege that resulted in the fatal shooting of PC Yvonne Fletcher. He was forced to resign from the cabinet over the Westland affair and spent a decade in Brussels as one of the UK’s European commissioners.
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