Tory grandee and Thatcher ally Norman Tebbit dies aged 94

Former Cabinet minister Lord Norman Tebbit (Chris Jackson/PA)

Tory former British cabinet minister Norman Tebbit has died aged 94, his son said.

The Conservative grandee was one of Margaret Thatcher’s closest political allies and played a key role in Tory politics for a generation.

As employment secretary he took on the trade unions, and as chairman of the Conservative Party from 1985 to 1987 he helped Mrs Thatcher secure her third general election victory.

He suffered grave injuries in the 1984 Brighton bombing, which left his wife, Margaret, paralysed from the neck down.

Mr Tebbit’s son William said his father died “peacefully at home” late on Monday night.

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said: “Norman Tebbit was an icon in British politics and his death will cause sadness across the political spectrum.

“He was one of the leading exponents of the philosophy we now know as Thatcherism and his unstinting service in the pursuit of improving our country should be held up as an inspiration to all Conservatives.”

Lord Tebbit outside the Grand Hotel in Brighton, scene of the 1984 bombing (Chris Ison/PA)

She said the “stoicism and courage” he showed following the Brighton bombing and the care he showed for his wife was a reminder that he was “first and foremost a family man who always held true to his principles”.

Mrs Badenoch said: “He never buckled under pressure and he never compromised.”

Mr Tebbit was a prominent figure in the Thatcher era with a reputation as a political bruiser unafraid of confrontation as he helped drive forward the economic and social reforms that characterised the 1980s.

Following inner city riots in Handsworth, Birmingham, and Brixton, south London, in 1981, he made comments which led to him being dubbed “Onyerbike” by critics who felt he was a symbol of Conservative indifference to rising unemployment.

Rejecting suggestions that street violence was a natural response to rising unemployment, he retorted: “I grew up in the Thirties with an unemployed father. He didn’t riot. He got on his bike and looked for work, and he kept looking till he found it.”

He was memorably described by Labour’s Michael Foot as a “semi-house-trained polecat” and was also nicknamed the “Chingford skinhead” in reference to his Essex constituency, while his puppet on satirical show Spitting Image was a leather jacket-clad hardman — an image Mr Tebbit enjoyed because “he was always a winner”.

In 1990, in response to concerns over integration of migrants, he set out the “cricket test”, suggesting which side British Asians supported in internationals should be seen as an indicator of whether they were loyal to the UK – leading to accusations of racism.

His Euroscepticism also caused him to be a thorn in the side of Mrs Thatcher’s successor John Major, whose Conservative leadership was marked by a series of battles over the issue.