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He married a girl who had left the school three years previously, Colleen Cleveley, who was to remain his marvellously supportive wife for more than half a century.In 1955, and again in 1959, he was invited to contest Harrow East against Ian Harvey. He applied himself to such effect that he ended up as a squadron leader and was even offered a permanent commission – which he declined in favour of going to the London School of Economics to read Economics and History under the wing of Professor Harold Laski.After a good degree he stayed on to do research, took a master’s degree and was invited back to his old school of Harrow Weald to run the sixth form. On the outbreak of the Second World War he went to Goldsmiths’ College to train as a teacher but was evacuated to Nottinghamshire and joined the RAF. When Rees was only six his father walked to London after the General Strike, got a job and brought his family to the capital.

However because they could only afford the most unsatisfactory lodgings the young Merlyn went back to stay with his grandmother for his primary education in Cilfynydd.As they were Welsh immigrants in a large Welsh community, although Rees went to Harrow Weald Grammar School he still thought of himself as Welsh. He was born in the pit village of Cilfynydd, which in the Welsh language means “between the mountains”. He would visit Ulster or Eire three or four times a year every year. And his book Northern Ireland: a personal perspective (1985) is and will be required reading for any serious historian of the province in the latter part of the 20th century.His father was a founder member of the Labour Party, and like his father and grandfather was a coalminer. Rees was to remain intensely and passionately involved in the problems of Ulster and the island of Ireland for the rest of his life. It was wholly proper.However, Merlyn Rees will go into the history books as the first Labour Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, for the years 1974-76. Many ministers display little interest in their portfolio after they have demitted the office over which they preside and with which they have been temporarily identified.

It never occurred to any of us, albeit that we might have disagreed with his policy and that of the Government, in any way to resent his influence on the Prime Minister. In these days when great resentments are caused by special advisers, over-mighty press secretaries, political chiefs of staff and their ilk, it may seem odd to say that Merlyn Rees’s pinnacle of influence came when he was special adviser-in-chief to the Prime Minister from 1976 to 1979.
He was also James Callaghan’s totally trusted Home Secretary, and a person elected in his own right who had been at the very heart of the Labour movement since he was personally chosen by Hugh Gaitskell to be organiser of the Festival of Labour in Battersea Park in 1962 – a task he undertook with gusto and success. Merlyn Rees, politician: born Cilfynydd, Glamorgan 18 December 1920; Lecturer in Economics, Luton College of Technology 1962-63; MP (Labour) for South Leeds 1963-83, for Morley and Leeds South 1983-92; Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Army 1965-66, for the RAF 1966-68, Home Office 1968-70; Secretary of State for Northern Ireland 1974-76; PC 1974; Home Secretary 1976-79; changed surname to Merlyn-Rees by deed poll 1992; created 1992 Baron Merlyn-Rees; Chancellor, University of Glamorgan 1994-2001; married 1949 Colleen Cleveley (three sons); died London 5 January 2006. Sixty per cent of teachers did not think that school choice is a reality for most parents.The Mori Teachers’ Omnibus survey covered a representative sample of 477 secondary school teachers in maintained schools in England and Wales..

“If we’re not careful, we’ll have selection by schools rather than selection of schools by parents.”Ms Kelly’s defiant speech comes as a Mori survey reveals that opposition to the Education White Paper proposals has grown among teachers over the past year.The findings will make worrying reading for ministers, who are preparing to mount a renewed defence of the plans, which have been opposed by Labour backbenchers, headteachers and unions.More than half of secondary school teachers in England and Wales (53 per cent) oppose the creation of city academies to raise standards in deprived areas, according to the poll of secondary school teachers commissioned by the Sutton Trust.This is an increase from the 37 per cent who gave this response to an identical question in last year’s Mori poll commissioned by the trust, which was set up in 1997 by Sir Peter Lampl, to help children from a deprived background.Only 26 per cent of teachers agreed with the Government’s approach, down from 36 per cent in 2004.Barry Sheerman, the chairman of the Education and Skills Select Committee, said: “As a practical matter, school teachers have to implement the proposals contained in the White Paper and the Government should be concerned that the number of teachers who are against school choice and city academies, two key proposals, outnumber those in favour by a factor of 2:1.”Sir Peter, the Sutton Trust’s chairman, said teachers had become increasingly opposed to city academies because of concerns about costs and the involvement of corporate sponsors.”I think teachers have become negative about academies because of their very high costs and concerns about sponsors who have little experience of managing educational establishments,” he said.The poll also revealed that teachers feel considerable doubt about extending greater school choice to parents. The “trust schools” would be allowed to draw up their own admissions policies.”We think that the Government should concentrate on making every school a good school,” she said. In an almost unprecedented bout of unity, leading figures in all three main political parties voiced opposition to the plans.Alison King, the Conservative who chairs the Local Government Association’s children’s committee, said she was concerned about the effect the proposals would have on school admissions policies. They will form partnerships with business foundations, charities or universities to help run the schools.It has become clear that she was facing mounting hostility to the proposals.

In the first speech by a government minister in 2006, she will insist the proposed new independently-run “trust schools” will help struggling children in deprived areas.
She will also make it clear to a conference of local authority leaders in Gateshead that there will be no going back on Tony Blair’s plans.Ms Kelly will publish a prospectus for the first time showing how “trust schools” will work. Now the left-wing maverick could be poised for his greatest challenge after setting out on Channel 4’s Celebrity Big Brother last night head to head against the usual array of past-their-sell-by-date celebs and wannabees.. The Education Secretary, Ruth Kelly, will today stake her political future on a robust defence of the Government’s school reforms. From the High Court to the hustings, the Right Honourable Member for Bethnal Green and Bow has played them all with characteristic swagger.