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Good morning.

Frank Field who died earlier this week has been regularly referred to as the veteran Labour MP and he certainly was, having served for 40 years in that capacity. But the thing about Frank was that he was a rather uncomfortable member of the Labour party for much of his time in Parliament -– and indeed eventually left the party in 2018.

We were friends, and I remember introducing him once when he was speaking in Cambridge, to general laughter including from him, as the Conservative Member for Birkenhead.

His discomfort with uncritical party loyalty was, of course, one of the things that made him popular. In an age when we tend not to admire, let alone love, politicians, you could walk down a street with Frank and discover that he was an exception. What people sensed about him, I think, was just that he was genuine, that for him politics wasn't about parties, and it certainly wasn't about personal advancement. Frank had gone into politics to do something about poverty - and people who would disagree with his diagnosis and proposed solutions, nonetheless respected his unwavering commitment to his cause. In Parliament and personally he spoke from the heart about the plight of the poor, and in particular of children brought up in poverty.

Just as Frank was a sometimes slightly uncomfortable member of the Labour Party, so too he was an uncomfortable member of the church. His Christian faith was hugely important to him, but just as politics for him was not about parties, so religion was not about denominational loyalties. Karl Marx, in his preface to Capital, mentions that 'the English Established Church will more readily pardon an attack on 38 of its 39 articles than on 1/39 of its income.' Frank was no Marxist to be sure, but he would have appreciated the wry reminder that churches, like political parties, can sometimes lose sight of what they are all about.

Jesus didn't exactly issue a manifesto, but his first public proclamation as reported in Luke's Gospel was a reading in the synagogue from the prophet Isaiah:

'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor'.
And later in the Gospel, when Zacchaeus, the tree climbing and repentant tax collector declares 'half of my goods I give to the poor', Jesus proclaims 'Today salvation has come to his house.'

Frank was uncomfortable in party and church, when loyalty is often seen as a key virtue. So, perhaps his most important legacy is his conviction that the important thing, is holding in sight the uncomfortable truth about poverty.

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