ABSTRACT
First elected for Bedwelty in 1970 Neil Kinnock was the first of a thousand generations of Kinnocks to go to university as the working class began to change and the Labour Party with it, eroding what had been a working class, trade union majority. When Labour's bubble burst with the left-wing revolt of the early eighties it was led by Tony Benn a far more ideological figure than Kinnock and a man arguing for a total democratisation of the party which went much further than Kinnock would have wanted because its aim was structural reform to make Labour permanently socialist and impose a left-wing programme, the longest suicide note in history. Kinnock abandoned his Euro-scepticism and became enthusiastic about membership and the prospects it would open up for a social democratic Labour Party and his wife Glenys, elected as a Euro-MP and his son Stephen were both working in the European Union strengthening his new commitment.
