And that's unusual because most moralists in politics are conventional in outlook. They claim to represent the broad masses and their values against the immoral subtleties of sophisticates. They speak favourably of the home, mother, family life, apple pie, cricket on the village green. Well, Gaitskell's morality wasn't the least bit like that. Now, a quest for truth is an uncomfortable creed for any career politician to have in any party, and especially in the ramshackle coalition that was the Labour Party of Gaitskell's time.
Astute politicians keep ramshackle coalitions together by a combination of myths and lies.
Well, Gaitskell wasn't like that. He didn't win arguments by deception. He drew people to him by his integrity. Now just in case that makes him sound like a bit of a saint, let me say straight away that his integrity had highly irritating features. When he was a Junior Minister, he kicked up a tremendous fuss about some completely unimportant matter because he thought his colleagues had acted unjustly.