Sir Patrick Duffy, the former Labour MP and defence minister, has died aged 105 following a short illness, a family friend has confirmed.
Sir Patrick died on 2 January and is believed to have been the UK’s longest-living former MP. The news prompted tributes to a politician whose career spanned much of the 20th century and whose life intersected with some of the most significant moments in modern British history.
Kevin Meagher, a writer who helped Sir Patrick publish his memoirs, described him as “kind of a living historical jukebox”, adding that you could “push the buttons and say, what was it like to meet, you know, [the former prime minister] Clement Attlee?”
Sir Patrick, who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II and also received a papal knighthood from Pope John Paul II, served during the second world war. While flying with the Fleet Air Arm, he survived a plane crash in the Orkney Islands, an experience that shaped the rest of his long life.
He first stood for parliament in 1950 and entered the House of Commons in 1963 after winning the Colne Valley by-election. Sir Patrick later represented Sheffield Attercliffe from 1970 until his retirement from frontline politics in 1992.
During the late 1970s, he served as parliamentary under-secretary for the Royal Navy under James Callaghan’s Labour government. He was also known for his willingness to speak out across party lines. Meagher recalled that Duffy “took a lot of flak” as the only MP who publicly “berated” Margaret Thatcher in 1981 over the death of the Republican hunger striker Bobby Sands.
Despite that clash, relations later softened. Meagher said Thatcher and Duffy would go on to have tea together, particularly during the period when Sir Patrick served as president of the Nato Assembly in the 1980s.
In a statement written by Meagher and approved by Sir Patrick’s family, he was described as “an extraordinary man with a lifetime of accomplishments”, adding that he left behind family and friends “across all age groups” who would miss his “kindness, humour and incredible acuity in recalling personalities and events from a century ago”.
The statement concluded, “Patrick’s was a life well-lived, brimming with achievement, the admiration of colleagues and the love and affection of his many family and friends. He will be greatly missed.”
Sir Patrick Duffy’s death marks the end of a remarkable political life that spanned war, peace and generations of British public life.
