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- Jul 5, 2003
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An alternative view of Cyril Smith
'Sir Cyril Smith should be stripped of his knighthood over asbestos speech
By Kevin Maguire 5/11/2008
Larger than life Sir Cyril Smith is learning the bigger they come, the harder they fall.
The reputation of the 20-stone grandaddy of the Lib Dems is irreparably damaged over the exposure of his cosy relationship with a merchant of death.
Smith loved to pose as the country's most popular MP, the original chat show politician, a regular on Saturday night TV when Charlie Kennedy was still in short trousers.
The 70s and 80s catchphrase "Nice one, Cyril" could have been written for Smith as he earned a following way beyond his seat of Rochdale.
But there's nothing nice about Smith's past dealings with Turner & Newall - once the world's largest asbestos giants - that today might have seen him booted out out of Parliament. Asbestos-related diseases such as me so the lioma are incurable killers, claiming 4,000 lives a year.
Yet the industry hid the lethal truth for decade after decade. And recently-released documents suggest Smith was too close to Turner & Newall for the health of the nation.
In 1981, amid a public clamour for a ban on the carcinogen, Smith was wining and dining company bosses and booking seats for them to hear him deliver a speech in the Commons, which he asked them to write.
"Could you please, within the next eight weeks, let me have the speech you would like to make (were you able to!), in that debate," Smith wrote to a Turner & New all director.
The brass neck of Smith was astonishing when I went to see him in Rochdale. He might be an octogenarian and have difficulty walking, but he's bright as a button - and shamelessly unrepentant.
"Of course the speech was extremely useful to me because it made it sound as if I could speak intelligently on a subject I knew little about," he declared.
Insisting he used only some of the script supplied by a local employer, he maintained 4,000 deaths was "relatively low" and conjured up a bizarre explanation.
"It's not like, how can I put it, like flu and contagious," asserted Smith. "It wasn't infections in the sense you can have a man and wife and one would have it and the other wouldn't."
But partners do die from inhaling dust on the clothes or hair of factory workers or tradesmen. As do members of the public.'
'Sir Cyril Smith should be stripped of his knighthood over asbestos speech
By Kevin Maguire 5/11/2008
Larger than life Sir Cyril Smith is learning the bigger they come, the harder they fall.
The reputation of the 20-stone grandaddy of the Lib Dems is irreparably damaged over the exposure of his cosy relationship with a merchant of death.
Smith loved to pose as the country's most popular MP, the original chat show politician, a regular on Saturday night TV when Charlie Kennedy was still in short trousers.
The 70s and 80s catchphrase "Nice one, Cyril" could have been written for Smith as he earned a following way beyond his seat of Rochdale.
But there's nothing nice about Smith's past dealings with Turner & Newall - once the world's largest asbestos giants - that today might have seen him booted out out of Parliament. Asbestos-related diseases such as me so the lioma are incurable killers, claiming 4,000 lives a year.
Yet the industry hid the lethal truth for decade after decade. And recently-released documents suggest Smith was too close to Turner & Newall for the health of the nation.
In 1981, amid a public clamour for a ban on the carcinogen, Smith was wining and dining company bosses and booking seats for them to hear him deliver a speech in the Commons, which he asked them to write.
"Could you please, within the next eight weeks, let me have the speech you would like to make (were you able to!), in that debate," Smith wrote to a Turner & New all director.
The brass neck of Smith was astonishing when I went to see him in Rochdale. He might be an octogenarian and have difficulty walking, but he's bright as a button - and shamelessly unrepentant.
"Of course the speech was extremely useful to me because it made it sound as if I could speak intelligently on a subject I knew little about," he declared.
Insisting he used only some of the script supplied by a local employer, he maintained 4,000 deaths was "relatively low" and conjured up a bizarre explanation.
"It's not like, how can I put it, like flu and contagious," asserted Smith. "It wasn't infections in the sense you can have a man and wife and one would have it and the other wouldn't."
But partners do die from inhaling dust on the clothes or hair of factory workers or tradesmen. As do members of the public.'
