what makes diane tick? profile By Tim Webb

It’s a fairly safe bet that the Member of Parliament for Hackney North & Stoke Newington was glad to see the back of 2003.

The year couldn’t have ended on a worse note for Diane Abbott. Embroiled in a controversy over her decision to send her son James to a £10,000 a year feepaying school, she was forced to admit to a contradiction between her public support for equal opportunities in education and her personal rejection of Hackney schools. She agreed that it was ‘indefensible’. It was also seen as a slap in the face for the borough’s teachers and an implicit statement that those who could afford to do so – particularly if they were from a black minority – should opt out of state-run schools. In the media furore that followed, one word cropped up frequently: hypocrisy.  So, is Diane still our socialist princess or just another well-heeled leftie who’s bought privilege for her boy? 

In her favour, it has to be said that when the row blew up, she didn’t duck the issue and was genuinely distressed. She could have pointed out that many relatively well-off parents, including some of her critics, have gone to extraordinary lengths to get their kids into ‘better’ state schools. Some have rediscovered religion, in order to gain access to segregated ‘faith’ schools. Others have managed to acquire addresses within favoured catchment areas. On the other hand, her statement that many black parents supported her in her choice and said that they would have done the same – if they could – seemed to miss the point. The reason that she was able to choose was that she had the money; they didn’t, and therefore had no opportunity to make that choice.

Her background is not one of deprivation although her Jamaican family wasn’t wealthy – her father was a welder, her mother a nurse – and she clearly enjoys most of the publicity that has come with her politics and position. There is something of the lite about Diane.

With her vivacity, ready smile and appearances on shows like ‘Have I Got News For You,’ she could easily be mistaken for a successful actress. Her breathless arrivals and an apparent inability to show up on time for meetings add to that impression. She had to apologise to the House of Commons for not declaring her earnings from TV. Fond of her food and the occasional drink, she is enjoyable company, and not above a bit of personal gossip from inside the Westminster bubble.

She attended Harrow School for Girls, where she met Michael Portillo (he was at the nearby boys’ school) and with whom she acted in school plays. Recently, they shared a regular political slot of chummy argument on television. Diane obtained a BA in History at Newnham College, Cambridge and became a civil servant, journalist and equal opportunities officer for the television technicians’ union. Somewhere along the line, she struck up a close friendship with the now disgraced former Tory minister, Jonathan (‘Sword of Truth’) Aitken, who is godfather to her son from a brief marriage.
Her occasional gaffes and open demeanour belie a shrewd instinct for political selfpreservation.

With a majority of over 13,000, her parliamentary position is secure and, happily for her, she was re-selected by the constituency party just before the news broke about her son’s education. Publicly scathing about Labour-run Hackney Council, she is a close adviser – on women and equality – to the populist London mayor Ken Livingstone. Although the Blair leadership sees her as an irritating red warning light flashing on the control panel of the Starship Modernise, there have been only half-hearted attempts to oppose her reselection. The main accusation, which carried little weight, was that she had not always obeyed the party whip.

If she had been more on-message, it is likely that she would now be a junior minister. But that would mean a dull existence; waiting for the pager to bleep, voting for illegal wars, university topup fees and sanctions against asylum seekers. No fun, principle or chat shows in that. In any case, she says that although she had great respect for the former party leader, John Smith, she believes that Tony Blair is a man who can be – putting it diplomatically – parsimonious with the truth. She is clearly sincere when she says she is proud that her original election meant a lot to ethnic minorities, and she believes that a major part of her role in Parliament is to provide a voice for those who are excluded from the political process, such as asylum seekers.

For her, the most frequent and important local issues are housing, immigration and the health service, particularly complaints about waiting lists. Even before her decision on her son’s education, she was involved in the debate about the under-achievement of young black males. She chaired the GLA conferences on London Schools and the Black Child that received widespread national publicity. Her view is that much of macho youth culture is anti-educational and the schools don’t do enough to correct this. When pressed, she also agrees that parents also have responsibility and they need to engage much more with the teachers. But her assessment is bleak: she insists that results for Afro-Caribbean boys in Hackney schools are getting worse.

I should declare an interest. I have always voted for Diane. The first time I saw her was at a Labour Party meeting at the Rose & Crown pub in 1986. The hot topic on the agenda was a demand that the Tory government should remove the Elgin marbles from the British Museum and return them, with apologies, to Greece. People in the streets of Hackney were talking of little else. Eventually, after points of order, pints of beer and a unanimous vote in favour of the motion, Diane was introduced as our new prospective parliamentary candidate.