Have been thinking all day about this interview I did with Margaret Beckett (nearly 10yrs ago) when she talked about going to the D-Day 50th anniversary as Leader of the Opposition. Have never forgotten it, because the memory quite suddenly and unexpectedly, reduced her to tears.

The piece was about the then 70th anniversary of the 1945 general election and this story came from nowhere. There is a particular Labour context here, a bit of Labour folk memory. But for me, her reaction is reflective of how embedded those events in Normandy in our national psyche, how D-Day means something substantial and substantially different in subtle ways for different people. And why the Sunak episode is so potentially damaging, with older voters, in particular.

Full piece is here, if you're interested.

Imagine having the amount of veterans to be able to talk to and share that with. Incredible. So few remain now.

I know. What a privilege to have been there.

Margaret Beckett is one of the many great Prime Ministers we never had... (as opposed to the growing number of Prime Ministers we wish we'd never had!)

Sense of circularity and natural justice about all this. The Conservatives have been trying to wreck the WW2 settlement for years (the Welfare State, the NHS, the EU & ECHR) and now, that great geopolitical event has reached out across the decades and bitten them on the behind.

Great clip; she said at the end she thought the veterans mobbed her because of their good memories of the Attlee Labour government, elected after the war, that introduced the NHS and welfare state.

Many people think Winston Churchill was the greatest Prime Minister but I think it was Clement Attlee

I remember how dignified she was in the Commons when John Smith died, a true statesperson. Doesn’t feel like there’s many of them left !

@LouHaigh That just choked me up.