Sitting with my mother, Pamela, in her care home, I think how much she is a child of the Convention that her father, David Maxwell Fyfe, championed and drafted. She was with him in Strasbourg in 1949 as work started at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe where the list of rights were being drawn up.
She believes in justice, the right to a fair trial, and no punishment without fair trial. For 30 years she was a Justice of the Peace and Chair of the Bench in Greenwich and Woolwich. For several of those she was considered a ‘lucky JP’ by the local police when they needed their warrants signed.
She believes passionately in the freedom of thought, conscience and religion. A child of another age, she never countenanced capital punishment, disagreeing with her father even when he was Home Secretary. But the disagreement didn’t stop her accompanying him to dinner at the House of Commons on the evening of his controversial Bentley decision. She considers, debates, and respects.
In quiet ways she is politically aware and active, supporting political candidates including John Sutcliffe in North Yorkshire and on her return to London providing a base camp for the present Father of the House, Peter Bottomley when he first stood for Parliament.
She is against discrimination and has a profound lifelong sense of equality. Her mother Sylvia was a suffragist and political activist who worked closely alongside her father, which gave her an insight into equality between sexes. Pamela is the first woman in the family to be university educated. She studied PPE at Oxford, at the college, which when it relented and let in men, educated Michael Gove and Dominic Raab. Afterwards she worked with Grace Wyndham Goldie at the BBC, and later worked on Equal Opportunities for Women at the Industrial Society. At home she developed and empowered her three daughters alongside her son.
She is the personification of the freedom to enjoy family life, marriage and home. At each stage in her life she has been a focus, relishing the freedoms that have enabled her to keep a welcoming, supportive home.
She exercises her right to a wonderful life, bringing warmth and light to those around her.
Many people have commented, with a greater or lesser degree of enthusiasm, that this is a family show, and very personal. I am inclined to agree with Nora Ephron:
‘And what’s so wrong about personal anyway? Whatever else anything is, it ought to begin by being personal.’
You’ve Got Mail, 1998 film written by Nora Ephron
Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms are not just laws, they are a way understanding ourselves, and they are under threat…
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Discover the what, why and how of the ECHR through the eyes of David Maxwell Fyfe at thehumansinthetelling.org
The Human's in the Telling 