Obituary: Donald Dewar

First Minister of Scotland's Parliament. Died on Wednesday, aged 63.


Scotland is mourning the man many called "Father of the Nation," the leader of Scotland's first Parliament for 300 years.

Donald Dewar was an unusual politician, a genial giant who towered above and viewed with distaste the usual faction-fighting. He was not Old Labour or New Labour, but the embodiment of Scottish Labour, determined to guard its independence from London.

Though an MP at Westminster for 26 years, Mr Dewar never lost his Scottish roots. The vacuum left by his death illustrates that he was the right man to deliver devolution and smooth ruffled feathers during the transitional period.

Born in 1937, an only child of a doctor, Mr Dewar had a solitary childhood which he did not shake off until he studied law at Glasgow University. He won the nickname "the Gannet" for his ability to devour food quickly and a tendency to stuff his pockets with sausage rolls.

He entered Parliament in 1966 as MP for Aberdeen South, but was defeated in 1970. It was his blackest year: his wife, Alison, with whom he had two children, left him for Derry Irvine, a contemporary at Glasgow, now the Lord Chancellor, and with whom Mr Dewar would sit in Tony Blair's Cabinet.

Mr Dewar cut a lonely figure again. At Christmas he preferred to stay home alone with fish fingers and a book.

He returned to the law, then won his seat, Glasgow Anniesland, in 1978.

During Labour's long wilderness years he sometimes confided privately that he doubted he would get the chance to implement what he called the "settled will of the Scottish people."

Politics was his life. He did not want the trappings of power, travelling happily to Westminster on the No 24 bus, seeking only the chance to make a difference.

The chance arrived after the 1997 general election, when Mr Blair switched him from Labour's chief whip to Secretary of State for Scotland. He led the referendum campaign in 1998 and piloted the Scotland Bill through Westminster to deliver the Scottish Parliament.

In June 1999, at the opening of the Scottish Parliament, the new First Minister said proudly: "Today there is a new voice in the land, the voice of a democratic Parliament. A voice to shape Scotland, a voice, above all, for the future."

His unifying skills helped to secure a coalition with the Liberal Democrats after an election campaign which exposed the down-side of Mr Dewar's approach to politics.

Colleagues despaired of his lack of strategy and campaigning skills, and the Chancellor, Gordon Brown, had to take over the Labour campaign to head off the threat from the Scottish National Party.

Nor was Mr Dewar's path smooth after the elections. He was criticised by the Scottish media over issues such as tuition fees and the new Parliament building at Holyrood - nicknamed "Donald's Dome" - the cost of which was said to have risen from £50 million to £230 million.

Then the Scottish executive's plans to abolish Section 28, which bans the promotion of homosexuality by local authorities, provoked a major controversy and raised fresh questions about his political judgment. But the executive won the day, after concessions.

Earlier this year, Mr Dewar had major heart surgery. On his return to work in August, he was confronted with a crisis. Thousands of students had been sent incomplete, late and inaccurate examination results. The man who gave and demanded loyalty refused to sack Sam Galbraith, his Education Minister. Then Mr Dewar had to help handle the fuel protests, requiring unexpected meetings in London with the other ministers appointed to deal with the crisis.

Colleagues say Mr Dewar was working too hard, too soon. He struggled to walk up stairs and got tired late at night. At the Labour conference in Brighton, he was ready for his bed earlier than usual, but dutifully held the ring at Scots Night until the special guest, John Prescott, appeared after 11 pm.

"Mentally, he was more than capable of taking on the work, but physically he seemed to get a wee bit tired by the end of the day," said his spokesman, David Whitton.

"He was trying to build parts into his day and week where he could sit back and think about things rather than being at constant rounds of meetings, but that goes with the type of job it is.

"He committed himself wholeheartedly to the job."

Nation in mourning

- INDEPENDENT