Jack Straw's 'troublemaking' past revealed

Jack Straw's 'troublemaking' past revealed

By Dominic Casciani
BBC News Online at the Public Record Office

Activist Straw learning about Chilean political life in 1966

British diplomats were so concerned with the young Jack Straw on a visit to Chile they cabled London to warn foreign office officials that their future boss was a "troublemaker... acting with malice aforethought".

Papers released by the Public Record Office reveal Mr Straw and 20 other student leaders, planning to build a youth centre in 1966, were considered "depressingly immature" and more concerned with furthering their own political careers than the job in hand.

ON JACK STRAW:

His apparent objective was to cause a minor scandal which would demonstrate that the present NUS executive was incapable of proper organisation - unlike its predecessor which had, I gather, a strong communist flavour

Alexander Stirling
Santiago embassy diplomat

Mr Straw later went on to become the first left-winger to lead the National Union of Students in more than a decade before holding two of the most senior posts possible in British government.

But in 1966, diplomats in Santiago believed they had to act to prevent a "minor scandal" and damage to Anglo-Chile relations.

The aim of the trip was for students to help build a youth centre on behalf of the British Council.

The students also reportedly wanted to find out more about Marxist opposition leader Salvador Allende, a man who later became a cause celebre for the British left following the 1974 coup by General Augusto Pinochet.

Potential damage

Some 34 years later, the trip came back to haunt Mr Straw when, as home secretary, he decided not to extradite Gen Pinochet to Spain to face charges of human rights abuses during his dictatorship. Mr Straw has also disputed reports that he had tea with Mr Allende on the 1966 trip.

But diplomats then were more concerned with potential damage that would be caused to the UK's reputation by the student party and Mr Straw.

Student leader: Rose to prominence in 1968

In a cable to London immediately after the visit, Alexander Stirling, a senior diplomat in the Santiago Embassy, warned that any future trips should be blocked if the Foreign Office was not consulted first.

"The recent visit of British students was a thoroughly disorganised venture, and should not be repeated unless some radically different arrangements can be made," he told London.

"While no real damage was done to Anglo-Chilean relations, this is likely to be due more to luck than to good management."

Disgrace and disagreements

Mr Stirling said Mr Straw and the other students were nearly sent home "in disgrace" because their trip had been so marred with disagreements with Chile's youth movement, not least because the youth centre was never completed.

Their childish politicking and the disorganisation to which they arrived hastened the splitting of the party into quarrelling factions

Alexander Stirling

While the student leaders may have arrived brimming with idealistic notions of international youth solidarity, their plans had been greeted with "nonchalance at the outset and near-insolence at the end" by the Chilean authorities.

Mr Stirling said Mr Straw and the British party was "pleasant and intelligent" but said their personal political ambitions showed them to be "depressingly immature."

"I understand that half of them have aspirations to office in the NUS and most seemed more interested in advancing their own or their associates' candidacies than in the job in hand," he said.

"Their childish politicking and the disorganisation to which they arrived hastened the splitting of the party into quarrelling factions."

Witch hunt

Singling out the future foreign secretary, Mr Stirling wrote: "I ought to add that we had the impression that Jack Straw, the appropriately named chief trouble-maker, was acting with malice aforethought.

"This impression might be entirely mistaken and I should hate to start a witch hunt, but he seemed deliberately to have brought matters to the point where the British Council had to intervene.

"His apparent objective was to cause a minor scandal which would demonstrate that the present NUS executive was incapable of proper organisation - unlike its predecessor which had, I gather, a strong communist flavour."

Salvador Allende: Hero to young Straw

The document does not detail the exact circumstances of how the Leeds University law student had so agitated British diplomats.

But the embassy was clearly concerned at the arrangements of trips around the country and with how the party apparently clashed with their Chilean counterparts.

"All this may, as I say, be quite unfounded," said Mr Stirling. "But Straw's actions and attitude strongly suggested that the trouble among the party did not happen altogether spontaneously.

"If this kind of visit is to be attempted again... it is essential that we and the British Council representative should be consulted in detail before any approach is made to the Chileans.

"It would be asking for real trouble to launch another such project unless we can be certain that it will not be as ill-prepared and unfortunate as this past one."

When Mr Straw was elected president of the NUS in 1969, he promised to make the organisation "respected rather than respectful" and this skills at raising the profile of students are fondly remembered by the body.

But after becoming Home Secretary in 1997, Leeds University students tore up his honorary lifetime membership in protest against his asylum policies.

There has long been speculation as to what files are held on the Mr Straw during his time as student leader, but he apparently turned down the opportunity to read his own MI5 file when he was home secretary.