80 Facts About Edward Heath

Sir Edward Richard George Heath was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1970 to 1974 and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1965 to 1975.

Outside politics, Edward Heath was a yachtsman, a musician, and an author.

Edward Heath worked briefly in the Civil Service, but resigned in order to stand for Parliament, and was elected for Bexley at the 1950 election.

Edward Heath was promoted to become Chief Whip by Anthony Eden in 1955, and in 1959 was appointed to the Cabinet by Harold Macmillan as Minister of Labour.

Edward Heath later held the role of Lord Privy Seal and in 1963, was made President of the Board of Trade by Alec Douglas-Home.

Edward Heath tried to reform British trade unionism with the Industrial Relations Act, and hoped to deregulate the economy and make a transfer from direct to indirect taxation, such as with the introduction of value-added tax in 1973.

Edward Heath chose to resign the leadership rather than contest the second round, returning to the backbenches, where he would remain until 2001.

Edward Heath's father was later a successful small businessman after taking over a building and decorating firm.

Edward Heath was four years old when his younger brother, John, was born; there was no question that Edward Heath was the "favoured brother".

Edward Heath was educated at Chatham House Grammar School in Ramsgate, and in 1935 with the aid of a county scholarship he went up to study at Balliol College, Oxford.

In June 1937 Edward Heath was elected President of the Oxford University Conservative Association as a pro-Spanish Republic candidate, in opposition to the pro-Franco John Stokes.

Edward Heath, who had himself applied to be the Conservative candidate for the by-election, accused the government in an October Union Debate of "turning all four cheeks" to Adolf Hitler, and was elected as President of the Oxford Union in November 1938, sponsored by Balliol, after winning the Presidential Debate that "This House has No Confidence in the National Government as presently constituted".

Edward Heath was thus President in Hilary term 1939; the visiting Leo Amery described him in his diaries as "a pleasant youth".

Edward Heath later described Himmler as "the most evil man I have ever met".

Edward Heath was in Germany for two months to learn German but did not keep up any fluency in the language in later life.

Edward Heath spent late 1939 and early 1940 on a debating tour of the United States before being called up.

Edward Heath participated as an adjutant in the Normandy landings, where he met Maurice Schumann, French Foreign Minister under Pompidou.

Edward Heath was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire, Military Division on 24 January 1946.

Edward Heath was demobilised in August 1946 and promoted to the substantive rank of lieutenant-colonel on 1 May 1947.

Edward Heath joined the Honourable Artillery Company as a lieutenant-colonel on 1 September 1951, in which he remained active throughout the 1950s, rising to commanding officer of the Second Battalion; a portrait of him in full dress uniform still hangs in the Queens Room of the HAC's Armoury House.

Edward Heath then became a civil servant in the Ministry of Civil Aviation.

Edward Heath joined a team under Alison Munro tasked with drawing up a scheme for British airports using some of the many Second World War RAF bases, and was specifically charged with planning the home counties.

Edward Heath made his maiden speech in the House of Commons on 26 June 1950, in which he appealed to the Labour government to participate in the Schuman Plan.

Edward Heath was appointed as an opposition whip by Winston Churchill in February 1951.

Edward Heath remained in the whips' office after the Conservatives won the 1951 general election, rising rapidly to Joint Deputy Chief Whip, Deputy Chief Whip and, in December 1955, Government Chief Whip under Anthony Eden.

Journalist Geoffrey Wheatcroft has observed that "Of all government jobs, this requires firmness and fairness allied to tact and patience and Edward Heath's ascent seems baffling in hindsight".

Edward Heath oversaw a successful application when serving as prime minister a decade later.

Edward Heath became the Conservatives' youngest leader and retained office following the party's defeat in the general election of 1966.

Edward Heath stated that the Selsdon weekend only reaffirmed policies that had actually been evolving since he became leader of the Conservative Party.

Scottish nationalism grew as a political force, while the decimalisation of British coinage, begun under the previous Labour government, was completed eight months after Edward Heath came to power.

Edward Heath did not divide England into regions, choosing instead to await the report of the Crowther Commission on the constitution; the 10 Government Office Regions were eventually set up by the Major government in 1994.

Edward Heath's planned economic policy changes remained largely unimplemented: the Selsdon policy document was more or less abandoned as unemployment increased considerably by 1972.

The economic boom did not last, and the Edward Heath government implemented various cuts that led to the abandonment of policy goals such as a planned expansion of nursery education.

Edward Heath took the United Kingdom into Europe on 1 January 1973, following passage in Parliament of the European Communities Act 1972 in October.

Edward Heath publicly supported the massive US bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong in December 1972.

Edward Heath refused to allow US intelligence gathering from British bases in Cyprus, resulting in a temporary halt in the US signals intelligence tap.

Edward Heath favoured links with the People's Republic of China, visiting Mao Zedong in Beijing in 1974 and 1975 and remaining an honoured guest in China on frequent visits thereafter and forming a close relationship with Mao's successor Deng Xiaoping.

Edward Heath realised that to become closer to Europe he needed to be further from the United States, so he downplayed the Special Relationship that had long knitted the two nations together.

Edward Heath served as Prime Minister during an especially violent period of the Troubles in Northern Ireland.

In 1971, Edward Heath sent MI6 officer Frank Steele to hold talks with the Provisional Irish Republican Army and find common ground to begin official negotiations.

In July 1972, Edward Heath permitted the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, William Whitelaw, to hold unofficial talks in London with an IRA delegation by Sean Mac Stiofain.

The proposal was finally brought down by the Unionist Ulster Workers' Council strike in 1974, by which time Edward Heath was no longer in office.

Edward Heath was targeted by the IRA for introducing internment without trial in Northern Ireland.

Edward Heath had been conducting a Christmas carol concert at Broadstairs and arrived home 10 minutes after the bomb exploded.

In January 2003, Edward Heath gave evidence to the Saville Inquiry and stated that he had never sanctioned unlawful lethal force in Northern Ireland.

Edward Heath began negotiations with Jeremy Thorpe, leader of the Liberal Party, but when these failed, he resigned as prime minister on 4 March 1974, and was replaced by Wilson's minority Labour government, eventually confirmed, though with a tiny majority, in a second election in October.

Edward Heath came to be seen as a liability by many Conservative MPs, party activists and newspaper editors.

Edward Heath's personality was considered cold and aloof, annoying even to his friends.

Edward Heath resolved to remain Conservative leader, even after losing the October 1974 general election, and at first it appeared that by calling on the loyalty of his front-bench colleagues he might prevail.

Neave deliberately understated Thatcher's support to attract wavering votes from MPs who were keen to see Edward Heath replaced even though they did not necessarily want Thatcher to replace him.

Edward Heath's favoured candidate, William Whitelaw, lost to Thatcher in the second vote one week later.

Edward Heath's advisors agreed he should wait at least six months, so he declined.

Edward Heath never relented and his refusal was called "the incredible sulk".

Edward Heath claimed that he had simply declined her request for advice about how to handle the press, whilst Thatcher claimed that she offered him any Shadow Cabinet position he wanted and asked him to lead the Conservative campaign in the imminent EEC referendum, only to be rudely rebuffed.

For many years, Edward Heath persisted in criticism of the party's new ideological direction.

Edward Heath continued to serve as a backbench MP for the London constituency of Old Bexley and Sidcup and was, from 1992, the longest-serving MP and the oldest British MP.

Edward Heath was created a Knight Companion of the Garter on 23 April 1992.

Edward Heath retired from Parliament at the 2001 general election.

Edward Heath maintained business links with several companies including a Saudi think tank, two investment funds and a Chinese freight operator, mainly as an adviser on China or a member of the governing board.

For four months, Edward Heath took the flat of Conservative MP Timothy Kitson; Kitson declined his offer to pay rent but later recalled an occasion when his own watch broke, and Edward Heath in response invited him to take one of a large collection that he had been given on his travels.

In February 1985, Edward Heath acquired a Wiltshire home, Arundells, in the Cathedral close at Salisbury, where he resided until his death twenty years later.

Edward Heath bought his first yacht Morning Cloud in 1969 and won the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race that year.

Edward Heath was a member of the Broadstairs Sailing Club, where he learnt to sail on a Snipe and a Fireball before moving on to success in larger boats.

Edward Heath conducted the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic and the English Chamber Orchestra, as well as orchestras in Germany and the United States.

Edward Heath was the founding President of the European Community Youth Orchestra, now the European Union Youth Orchestra.

Edward Heath wrote several books in the second half of the 1970s: Sailing, Music, and Travels.

Edward Heath compiled a collection of carols called The Joy of Christmas, published in 1978 by Oxford University Press, which contained the music and lyrics to a wide variety of Christmas carols, each accompanied by a reproduction of a piece of religious art and a short introduction by Heath.

In 1964, despite substantial opposition from many Conservative MPs and independent grocers and shopkeepers, Edward Heath led a successful fight to abolish resale price maintenance.

Edward Heath had been expected to marry childhood friend Kay Raven, who was reportedly tired of waiting and married an RAF officer whom she met on holiday in 1950.

Edward Heath later said the most intimate thing Heath had done was to put his arm around her shoulder.

In later life, according to his official biographer Philip Ziegler, at dinner parties Edward Heath was "apt to relapse into morose silence or completely ignore the woman next to him and talk across her to the nearest man"; others at the time claimed Edward Heath was just not talkative at parties.

Brian Coleman, the Conservative Party London Assembly member for Barnet and Camden, claimed in 2007 that Edward Heath, to protect his career, had stopped cottaging in the 1950s.

Coleman said it was "common knowledge" among Conservatives that Edward Heath had been given a stern warning by police when he underwent background checks for the post of privy counsellor.

Edward Heath believes Heath to have been asexual, although he does mention a letter from one "Freddy", who seems hurt that "Teddie" had spurned his advances.

Charles Moore, in his authorised biography of Margaret Thatcher, said that Bill Deedes believed that Thatcher "seem[ed] convinced" Edward Heath was gay, whilst Moore believed it is "possible" that Thatcher's reference, in interview in 1974, to Edward Heath not having a family, was a deliberate hint that he was gay, in order to discredit him.

When he moved to Arundells in 1985, Edward Heath hired Derek Frost, life partner of Jeremy Norman, to modernise and redecorate the house in Salisbury.

Edward Heath became friends with the couple, though never close.

Allegations about Edward Heath were investigated as part of Operation Midland, the Metropolitan Police inquiry into claims of historic child abuse and related homicides.

Police said that if Edward Heath were still alive they would have interviewed him under caution in relation to seven out of the 42 allegations, but nothing should be inferred about his guilt or innocence.

Edward Heath was cremated on 25 July 2005 at a funeral service attended by 1,500 people.