GEORGE ORWELL: 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF HIS DEATH

Early day motion 273, tabled 17 January 2000 by David Winnick (Labour). Signed by 76 members.

That this House pays tribute to the memory of George Orwell on the 50th anniversary of his death; recognises his stature as one of the great British writers, his commitment to substantial domestic reforms to alleviate the acute hardship for so many in the thirties, his anti-fascism, which led him to fight for republican Spain, his enthusiastic support from the start for the war against Nazism and his independence of mind, shown so clearly in his essays and the regular column he wrote for Tribune; and is pleased that his two masterpieces, with their brilliant exposure of totalitarian communism, continue to be widely read, and not least in the former communist states.

Signatures by party: Labour 61, Labour/Co-operative 7, Liberal Democrat 4, Conservative 3, Plaid Cymru 1.