These past few days have been deeply distressing as I have sought to come to terms with the violent death of a dear friend, a Catholic who placed her faith at the heart of everything she stood for.
Like her or loathe her, Ann Widdecombe was a fearless defender of the right to freedom of speech, an impressive debater and a doughty champion of causes she believed in. These included causes that few others were willing to get behind – such as standing up for persecuted Christians.
Everyone found something to disagree with her about, but there was no doubting the sincerity of her search for truth and justice, her loyalty to her friends or her willingness to speak out when others would find it more expedient – or personally beneficial – to keep silent.
I first came to know Ann nearly 30 years ago, when I was a trainee reporter on the Kent Messenger in Maidstone – the heart of her constituency. Whatever my fellow journalists’ views of her politics, she was recognised across the newsroom as a remarkable constituency MP – passionate, committed, media-savvy and idiosyncratic in a way that we Brits know well.
My first major encounter with Ann came when I was dispatched to cover a public meeting in a village near Maidstone. Her vivid dissection of the intricate issue at hand was like a hot knife through butter – articulate, ruthlessly logical and determined to find a solution.
Afterwards I approached her, rather nervously, to see whether she would be willing to write a leader article for The Parishioner, the newspaper I had just helped to found serving the Catholic parish of St Francis, Maidstone. Predictably combative, Ann’s piece, punctually delivered, argued that England’s bishops should do more to “put their mitres above the parapet” in defending Christian values in society.
As a new convert in those days, Ann sought me out as a fellow Catholic and invited me to her constituency home, a bungalow in the village of Sutton Valence, south of Maidstone. There I came face to face with Ann’s one weakness in life – chocolate – as she presented me with a plate piled high with cupcakes. If I recall correctly, she ate most of them (sorry, Ann!).
The fact that she reminded me of a number of my more formidable aunts perhaps gave me an advantage in handling Ann. Certainly, I quickly learned that she would brook no nonsense and had no use for ideas that were impractical.
After I moved to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), we continued to keep in touch. I would meet her at her parliamentary office in Portcullis House, Westminster, where she heard first-hand accounts of the persecution of Christians from Church leaders such as Bishop – now Cardinal – Joseph Coutts of Pakistan. Through this regular contact, I persuaded Ann to be the star turn at an ACN event at St Mary’s Church, West Croydon.
There, Ann wowed the audience with a barnstorming speech setting out the importance of campaigning for persecuted Christians and being unapologetic about the Faith we hold dear. The coherence of her argument and her peerless debating skills enlivened my thinking about the human rights that underpin all our endeavours for persecuted and other suffering Christians. To her it was a matter of conscience – a set of values formed by faith – and, to that extent, she fundamentally altered my sense of the importance of ACN’s work.
After she found fame on Strictly Come Dancing in 2010, I thought she probably would not have time for us, but she did. The following year she packed out Westminster Cathedral Hall, where she gave the keynote address at the 2011 ACN (UK) Westminster Event – attracting possibly the highest attendance in all the years we staged it.
It was then that – using her eye for a headline-grabbing phrase – she said: “You stand a better chance of earnest representation if you are a hedgehog than if you are a persecuted Christian.”
She personally called on those present to advocate for individual groups of persecuted Christians, challenging people to write to their MPs, write letters, learn about the issues and champion the cause. For every brilliantly articulated concept she put forward relating to religious freedom, she gave a practical suggestion about how it could be put into effect.
By this stage, Ann and I would meet periodically at her club – the Carlton Club, in St James’s. I would join her for breakfast, doing my best to remember her various instructions, aware that protocol forbade the taking of notes in such an illustrious setting.
As we left the dining room on one occasion, I remember she stopped to emphasise a particular point she wanted to make. As she did so, she became uncharacteristically distracted. She had suddenly realised that she was standing beneath a portrait of her one-time nemesis, Michael Howard, whom she had famously challenged when he was Home Secretary and she was Prisons Minister. She said to me, with a glint in her eye: “Perhaps this wasn’t the best place to stop.”
In due course, she willingly submitted herself to helping strengthen ACN’s media profile and, in this capacity, she was named ACN (UK)’s Special Envoy for Religious Freedom.
One of her plans to gain press exposure for persecuted Christians involved her friend Aaqil Ahmad, then the BBC’s Head of Religion and Ethics. The idea was to make a television documentary about persecuted Christians in Pakistan. I remember accompanying Ann to meet Aaqil at BBC Television Centre in Wood Lane, where she presented a compelling pitch which, sadly, never came to pass.
Ann Widdecombe was not everyone’s cup of tea. Not everyone agreed with her politics. I met her on the day in 2019 when she announced her return to politics as a candidate for the Brexit Party. She explained with gusto the conviction that had led her to make the move.
We remained firm friends to the end, exchanging Christmas cards each year. She would write a short note inside every card. Her messages were unfailingly thoughtful, kind and supportive, qualities noted by so many of her friends over the past few days. Re-reading them has been no small consolation as I have reeled in horror at the cruel barbarity of her death.
I grieve her passing as a friend and a woman of moral courage. As the police investigation into her death unfolds, we may yet discover that it was this fearless commitment to conscience that cost Ann her life.
May God grant Ann Widdecombe a place in His heavenly kingdom and the joy of life in His presence.
John Pontifex is head of press & public affairs, Aid to the Church in Need (UK).
