Lord (Tim) Garden, a former Air Marshal and the party’s defence spokesman in the Lords, has sadly died. There’s an obituary in today’s Telegraph and also a tribute on the party’s website.
UPDATE: The Guardian has now published an obituary by Jonathan Fryer.
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12 Comments
A really sad loss – worked like a pack horse, and was undoubtedly an expert in his field as well as, in my very limited contact with him, a very nice bloke. Passionate. A great loss.
Setting aside my political differences with you guys but I am very saddened by this news and can only offer my deepest sympathy to his family, his friends and to his colleagues.
I actually met Tim at a reception event last year and he was a very nice man and had the time to have a photo taken with me which was very kind of him.
His death is a sad loss to politics and in particular the House of Lords its going to going to be the same place without him.
May he rest in peace.
A brilliant speaker on the Radio, he will be missed. He gave a real authority to the party.
How sad – he was a really nice guy as well as a top spokesman.
A lot of positive memories of him from the army here:
http://www.arrse.co.uk/cpgn2/Forums/viewtopic/t=74836.html
It is awful news. I first met Tim Garden in 2000 when I was on the Defence Policy Working Group (which produced the paper “Defending Democracy”).
Tim’s attitude to callow and ill-informed people as I then was (and probably still am) could not have been more patient, respectful and helpful.
The country and the party are tangibly lesser insitutions without him.
Tim Garden, a well respected former Service colleague, was no more a former Air Marshall than he was a former Admirall or former Generall. You do the dignity of his memory no favours by committing this common but ignorant misspelling.
Terrible news. When I learned he had decided to become a Lib Dem peer a couple of years ago, I was delighted. It was excellent to have such an authoritative voice on our side.
Now we no longer have him. He worked incredibly hard in Parliament, as well as internally in the party for us. A truly tragic loss.
I am so sad. I met him and his wife at the Harrogate Conference this year.
A true Lib Dem with an enthusiasm for the House of Lords and an infinite knowledge.
My sympathy to his charming wife.
I too join in as we mourn the untimely death of a very much loved fellow member of our Party.
I had the privilege of working with Tim on the FPC and was always struck by his uncompromising stand for Justice and Fairness. And of course in public he could be relied on the represent the Party in its best light
I know Tim will be remembered as a giant of man who was always willing to make time for the ordinary person.
I for one will be proud to claim to have known him
I’d also like to say how sad it is to lose Tim and send my condolences to Sue and the family. I first met Tim half a dozen years ago, when he was one of the guests at an FPC meeting I chaired to discuss a new Defence policy paper. An MP batting for the paper did so in rather a macho way, and FPC wasn’t entirely taken with his calls for spending on unnecessary prestige projects way over the cost that any other ‘department’ might ask for. Pressed for his expert opinion – and just this once I’ll name a speaker at FPC – Tim sat back judiciously, smiled, and said that, actually, that particular project could probably be dropped, but here were some that couldn’t and this was why.
Once he was elected to the Committee in his own right, he displayed the same careful choice on when to comment, the same wry humour, the same ability to deflate pomposity, and the same highly informed and deeply sensible level of contribution. I didn’t always agree with him, but there are very few FPC members I’ve seen in over a decade on and off the Policy Committee who’ve made me think as much as Tim did that we really, really benefited from his being there. A nice bloke, too.
I had a call from my father last night. “Tim Garden has died”, he said. I simply couldn’t believe it. I met Tim when my father was stationed at RAF Odiham – 1986 to 1987 – and although only meeting Tim on a few occasions, he made an impression that helped shape me into the man I have become. Truly…the world has lost someone who ‘added’, rather than just ‘took’. Rest in peace, Sir.
As a young man a few years older than Tim I worked for his father, Joe, who was Manager of Drive Electronics at Heenan & Froude Worcester.
I actually taught Tim the morse code and introduced him to amateur radio technology at the request of his father.
His father and mother were very nice folks and I am sure they would have been immensely proud of Tim and who wouldn,t be? I am proud to have known him in his youth.