He did a lot for victims of thalidomide and opren, changing the law so that these big drug companies could not hide behind and excuse of doing what they thought was engough checking.

Old school politician: driven by high morals. You might not like his morals but at least he had them. The type of bloke you fight hard to get in your team at work but at times wonder why.

Yep Old school politician. Not many like him left.

It was civil law, not something I know all that much about. But at the time, or rather some time after the horrors of the drug were revealed, The Times ran a campaign for compensation for the victims to be paid quickly rather than the glacial speed of normal civil courts. It was some time ago and the intricacies of the change in procedures weren't all that clear then so no hope now but Ashley campaigned for the victims rather forcibly.

There was a visit to St Paul's Cathederal by victims, organised by a charity, in the middle 70s and I was detailed to help with parking of the two/three special coaches. In the end I helped take these kids, then teenagers, up the steps and into the church.

One was in what can only be described as a padded coffin. He had no arms or legs. I was talking to the driver when waiting for their return and he was saying how much they owned to Ashley. Bit of a hero of his. I followed his career from then on to an extent.

Once you've seen the victims you can't forget them. One PC got 'the shakes', really badly affected. The bus had alochol on board and he was given a glass but his hands were shaking so badly that he splashed most of it over his uniform. Really quite shocking. A horror story worse than any film I reckon.

What was so good about this guy? As far as I can tell he was just another Labour socialist who happened to lose his hearing and then started campaigning for the deaf. Is there something I've missed?

Yeah, you're missing your fking brain you ignorant dipst.

Well that statement does mark you out as a bit of a bellend.


Ok then lets try this.

At a time when it was a thorny issue he was one of the vocal supporters for the swift payment of compensation to thalidomide victims, his main concern was that they got paid before they died. He was (i think) the first completely deaf politician in the UK and possibly the world. He learnt to lip-read in a matter of months in order to avoid the need to resign from the house of commons and was partly responsible for the BBC live subtitles service meaning that deaf people could watch current affairs programs and be kept up to date with the world.

Probably not important to you if you can hear.

I only know about him due to my Grandma working with deaf people when she was younger and i have always remembered the Subtitles thing.

Without subtitles i would have had real issues with watching TV when i was younger. I'm not deaf but once my Mother got nattering on the phone subtitles were the only way i could tell what was going on, she would always turn the bloody volume down but stay sat on the sofa