Forth served as a junior minister in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major between 1988 and 1997. In his obituaries, he was described as "colourful", "flamboyant", "provocative" and a "right-wing libertarian". He was noted for his colourful ties and waistcoats.[1]
He was elected to the House of Commons at the 1983 general election with a majority of 14,205 votes for the new seat of Mid-Worcestershire. His political views were apparent from his maiden speech, in which he attacked the Sex Equality Bill, and he was an early member of the No Turning Back group. Following boundary changes to his constituency, he was not selected to fight the new seat with the same name, losing out to the sitting MP for Worcester, Peter Luff. Forth found a safe seat in the Outer London suburbs for Bromley and Chislehurst in the heart of the large London Borough of Bromley. He was elected to represent the seat in 1997, 2001 and 2005.
Forth had hoped to support Michael Portillo for the leadership of the Conservative Party, to follow Major, but Portillo famously lost his seat in the 1997 general election. Forth was then Peter Lilley's campaign manager until the latter withdrew, then supported John Redwood, and finally backed eventual winner William Hague. Forth refused the offer of a place in the Conservative shadow ministerial team and instead became a leading backbench irritant to the Labour government, engaging in "a Parliamentary form of guerrilla warfare".[6] Initially acting as a loner and concentrating on private members bills to which he objected, Forth soon gathered a small group around him known as "the awkward squad".
In 1997, with senior Conservative MPs David Maclean and Patrick McLoughlin, he established the Policy Research Unit, a subscription briefing service available to any MP as a means of countering the briefings that government ministers receive from the civil service.[7]
Disliking e-mail, he would send brief written notes to like-minded MPs to say "I am given to understand that the Powers That Be think that Wednesday's business will go through easily", and his group would ensure that Wednesday's business did not go through easily.[8] Forth's speciality was the filibuster: as Labour MPs found themselves often required to remain in Parliament past midnight, they called him "Bloody Eric Forth" (a reaction Forth welcomed). Iain Duncan Smith appointed Forth Shadow Leader of the House of Commons in 2001. Forth backed David Davis to replace Duncan Smith in 2003: Davis refused to stand, and Forth was dismissed from his front-bench position by Michael Howard. He served on many Parliamentary committees and his last role was chairing the statutory instruments committee. He was a member of the speaker's Panel of Chairmen.[citation needed]
Forth was in favour of capital punishment, but opposed corporal punishment in schools. After William Hague announced his support for an "election compact" promoted by the Commission for Racial Equality in 2001, Forth was quoted as saying at a private dinner: "All this sucking up to minorities is ridiculous; there are millions of people in this country who are white, Anglo-Saxon and bigoted and they need to be represented."[9] He opposed the BBC's spending money on a Nelson Mandela concert in 1988, saying "those who want the arts and who support them should pay for them themselves".[10] He also opposed the government spending on AIDS treatment, saying that the disease was "largely self-inflicted".[9] He was a fan of Elvis Presley and treasurer of the all-party Music Appreciation Group, and a couple of Presley's songs were played at Forth's memorial service in October 2006.[citation needed]
Personal life
Forth was married to Linda St. Clair on 11 March 1967 and they had two daughters before their divorce in 1994; he remarried later that year to Carroll Goff, gaining a stepson.[11] Forth died from cancer at Charing Cross Hospital on 17 May 2006, at the age of 61.[12]
Publications
Regional Policy: A Fringe Benefit? by Eric Forth, 1983, Conservative Central Office, CCO508912
