Robin & the GLC
This is the text delivered by Michael Ward at Robin Murray’s Memorial Service on 29th November 2017
It’s a good time to be talking about Robin. Earlier this year Sadiq Khan announced that he was producing a London Industrial Strategy. I sent him a copy of one we made earlier. And just this week the Government published an Industrial Strategy.
In 1981 a group of us were elected to run the Greater London Council. We had developed an ambitious programme to renew the London economy. And we were looking for a Chief Economic Advisor to lead that programme. There had never been such a post before.
Appointing new staff wasn’t straightforward. It took us some time to get approval for our initial team. After the job had been advertised, the existing permanent officials first put forward a long list of candidates, who they interviewed themselves. They then put forward a short list for the elected members to interview.
Hilary Wainwright told me about Robin, who at that time I had not met. He applied. The officials did not recommend him for the long list. We asked them to add his name. Then they did not recommend him for the short list of candidates we were to interview.
The Director General, the most senior official, said
“Oh, give Mr Murray the job and he would not be satisfied with London for long. He would want the whole world.”
And so we did give Mr Murray the job.
After he had started, he reported back on his first visit to the Director General’s office in County Hall:
“Can you imagine anything more pretentious? A room with a perfect view across the river to Big Ben – and a grandfather clock in the corner.”
We started with a small team – Hilary, Nick Sharman, Peter Brayshaw and Mike Cooley; when the Greater London Enterprise Board started, Nick and Mike moved across to it, where they were joined by Alan McGarvey and John Palmer.
Pamela Gordon, who had been an Assistant Director General, came to join us as Robin’s deputy. She, and a succession of finance experts seconded by Maurice Stonefrost, the Head of Finance, were critical in harnessing the knowledge, professionalism, and often the enthusiasm of long-standing career GLC staff.
Robin’s warmth and humanity meant that he could win the trust and confidence of people from many different backgrounds. For Robin, like William Morris, fellowship was all.
Robin was never afraid to challenge entrenched thinking – whether it came from the Government, the GLC bureaucracy, or the traditional left. He argued that the left should not oppose technological change, or European integration, but should welcome their potential. He argued that, although Labour and the trade unions had often seen manufacturing jobs as the only ‘real jobs’, service jobs would be of growing importance. There was a new emphasis on women’s employment in the London Industrial Strategy.
He challenged the old left’s traditional faith in the big state, preferring local, mutual, participative, community, and cooperative approaches. This came from his Brighton experience as well as from his international work. Robin had clear views, formed in constant, exciting debate; nevertheless, the Industry and Employment Branch was a rainbow coalition in which all possible shades of opinion were represented, often working harmoniously.
Night after night, the lights burned late at County Hall as we hammered out new policies in the interests (as the legal framework demanded) of ‘all or some of the people of London’.
And no, he was not satisfied with London for long. Robin was an uncompromising internationalist. We put Council resources behind the efforts of trades unions in multinational companies like Ford and Kodak to organise across national boundaries.
Robin brought Michael Barratt Brown to the GLC, and together they worked to develop the concept of Fair Trade, establishing TWIN, which trades coffee and cocoa, and still flourishes thirty years later, always exploring how to combine social values with economic viability.
Four years ago I went with Robin to a memorial event in London for Raul, a Latin American coffee producer who had been on the TWIN board, and had died too young.
At the end, everyone shouted – ‘Raul presente’ – Raul is here with us – and that is what I feel today about Robin.
But I also think, if he was here, he would quickly become impatient with our tributes, and say
“This stuff is all very well; but don’t mourn – organize.”
29th November 2017