It kicks off tonight with the Inaugural Dying Matters Lecture in London, delivered by Professor David Cunningham, and followed by a panel discussion chaired by me, with publisher Gail Rebuck and her daughter Georgia Gould joining Professor Cunningham on the panel.

Why him? Because he was the surgeon who cared for Philip Gould. Why Gail and Georgia? Because Gail was married to Philip, and Georgia is their daughter. Why me? Because Philip was my best friend, and also because in my work with Time to Change, I am in the taboo-breaking business.

I can hardly believe it is now a year and a half since Philip died. I think about him every day. I thought about him a lot yesterday, when I was at Alex Ferguson’s last home game as Manchester United manager, because Philip died when I was at a dinner in Manchester celebrating Fergie’s 25 years in charge, and I got the call amid an amazing performance from modern bagpipe band the Red Hot Chilli Pipers.

He taught us a lot in the manner of his dying, and that will be part of the lecture tonight. He wrote a wonderful book, When I Die. He updated his earlier political book, The Unfinished Revolution, and inspired another, The Unfinished Life. His death was also a big part of my own short book, The Happy Depressive.

The message from all of them was that he engaged with his death, learned from the experience of dying, used it to make sense of his life, his politics, his relationships. It was almost as though he was enjoying it. ‘Philip,’ I said to him at one point ‘you can’t really be happy that you’re going to die?’

‘Well no,’ he said, ‘but I feel I have lived a good life and I feel these days and weeks have been amazing, maybe the most intense days and feelings of my life. It has made me feel whole. It has made me appreciate my life, my politics, my family, my friendships, more than I would if I had gone on and on and died of old age. I really do feel happy about that.’ I definitely feel different about death, and about life, for having seen how he faced up to death.

Dying Matters Awareness Week is organised by the Dying Matters Coalition, and was set up in 2009 by the National Council for Palliative Care to try to break the taboo about discussing dying and to make it easier for all of us to get our wishes met at the end of our lives.

Dying Matters now has over 30,000 members across England including charities, care homes, hospices, hospitals, funeral, legal and financial services, pensioner, carer and bereavement services and individuals including those with life limiting conditions.

At the end of the event this evening, seeing how twitter now has to be part of any happening, I will be promoting something called Final Tweets, or #FinalTweets as we call it in Twitterland. Dying Matters are asking people to tweet what their final last words would be, be they pithy, poetic, poignant or prophetic. Final Tweets should be no longer than 128 characters and can be tweeted, emailed or posted – and the plan is to publish a selection of people’s Final Tweets. More details can be found at www.dyingmatters.org/page/final-tweet

And here is mine, which I have just tweeted.

‘Glad I’ve gone before Fiona. Not sure I’d cope without her. Kids be happy but change the world. Ashes Turf Moor pls #FinalTweets‘

And here is the top of the press release on new research suggesting more of us have to face up to our own mortality.

MILLIONS RISKING LEAVING IT TOO LATE TO DISCUSS DYING WISHES

New research for the Dying Matters Coalition shows that the majority of people in Britain have not discussed or made any plans for when they die, and are risking not getting appropriate end of life care and making it harder for their families to deal with bereavement.

The British Social Attitudes (BSA) research released to coincide with Dying Matters Awareness Week (13-19 May) finds encouraging signs that older people are increasingly taking action to make their end of life wishes known but that most people are leaving it too late to face up to their own mortality. This is despite the fact that almost two-thirds of us (63%) have been bereaved in the last five years.

Today’s study reveals that although 70% of the public say they are comfortable talking about death, most of us haven’t done anything to discuss our end of life wishes or put plans in place:

• Only just over one in three people (35%) have a will, down on 39% in 2009 – with the impact of economic pressures being a possible cause of this decline.
• Fewer than a third of people (28%) have registered as an organ donor or have a donor card – although the number of organ donations after death has risen by 50% since 2008, more than 1,000 people on the transplant waiting list die each year (NHS Blood and Transplant figures).
• Only 11% of people have written down their funeral wishes/made a funeral plan.

‘Alex Ferguson and Alastair Campbell have been friends for many years. One is the greatest manager in British football history, who has a passion for politics. The other helped Labour win three successive election victories, and has a passion for football. As Campbell’s diaries showed, he and the Manchester United manager speak regularly – about politics, sport, pressure, the ups and downs of living with the 24-hour media, and a shared obsessiveness about winning. In the week after Campbell agreed to be guest editor of the New Statesman, as Sir Alex prepared at the team hotel in London before the Carling Cup Final, we asked them to allow us to eavesdrop on one of their conversations

Alastair Campbell: This is primarily a political magazine, so let’s kick off with politics, and we’ll come to the stuff people are really interested in later. On a scale of one to ten, how political do you think you are?

Alex Ferguson: Well, I guess I’d have to be a ten on football. Football has been the big thing in my life for so long. In this job, it is in your mind all the time. There is so much you have to focus on. With politics, I’m interested in it, I follow it, I read political history and I have strong political views. So I would say around seven and a half. It’s probably the other way round for you, isn’t it?

AC: Not this year, it’s not.

AF: That’s true, Burnley have had a hell of a season. It should have been a United-Burnley final tomorrow.

AC: Don’t remind me. Losing the semi-final was absolute torture. Where do you think your politics come from?

AF: My background and my upbringing. My dad was on the left, and so were most people where I came from. I grew up in a very working-class area of Glasgow and I was always very conscious of the sense of community, people and families supporting each other. I grew up believing Labour was the party of the working man, and I still believe that. Then, when I was working in the shipyards on Clydeside, I realised how important it was that people had proper representation and I got involved as a shop steward in the union. I led an unofficial walkout over pay. There was another thing that politicised me even more as an adult, and that was when my mother was dying in November 1986, just a couple of weeks after I took over at United. She was at the Southern General in Glasgow, and it was absolutely dreadful, cladding hanging off the pipes, doctors and nurses overworked, and so little dignity ­attached to it. All my life I’ve seen Labour as the party working to get better health care for ordinary people, and the Tories really only caring about the people at the top. The NHS is definitely better after 12 years of Labour.

AC: You’ve come a long way since then, though, and your success has coincided with the TV explosion and the in­troduction of phenomenal wealth into football, so you’re seriously rich compared to most of the people you grew up with. Is it possible to have that wealth and still hold those political views?

AF: Of course it is. I still keep in touch with friends from those days, and I always will. It’s true I’ve earned a lot of money. But I’ve worked hard, pay my taxes and put a lot back in different ways. I think part of Tony Blair’s success as a leader was showing success and Labour could go together.

AC: What do you think politics and sport can learn from each other?

AF: I think you can learn something about your own world from anyone else’s. I read a lot of history, and in most history books there won’t be a mention of sport, but there are always insights you can learn. Like that book you sent me last summer, the one about Abraham Lincoln . . .

AC: Team of Rivals.

AF: Yes, my God, what a brilliant book. I read it on holiday and even though it was so long, I couldn’t get enough of it. And of course the big story was slavery and the civil war, but what was fascinating was how he held together all these big personalities, the ones who had tried to stop him becoming president, to make sure they stayed roughly on the same track. Now, he was president of the United States in a totally different era. I am a manager of a football team. But I can learn about the art of team building and team management from all sorts of places. It’s all about managing people and relationships, in the end.

AC: But it’s changed so much since you were a player, or since you started at United. You’ve got players in their early twenties who are multimillionaires, and celebrated in a way footballers in your playing days were not, at least not in the same way. That must have changed the nature of management.

AF: The thing is, I have been here while all these changes have gone on, and I’ve managed to adapt and help players adapt. I was here before agent power, before freedom of contract, before the really big money from TV kicked in. Part of my job is to make sure these lads keep their feet on the ground. I hammer it into them that the work ethic is what got them through the door here in the first place, and they must never lose it. I say to them, “When you’re going home to your mother, you make sure she’s seeing the same person she sent to me, because if you take all this fame and money the wrong way, your mother’ll be disappointed with you.”

AC: And does all the fame and the money change them for the worse?

AF: Well, some footballers it might, but look at [Manchester United’s] Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs, Gary Neville, model professionals who have also handled the celebrity status well. So then the younger ones look up to them, too. You’re talking about some really big characters in a top football club. And the job of the manager is to get the best out of them, for the team as a whole, and always be looking to the future as well. That must be so important in politics, too.

AC: It is. The best leaders build the best teams. Have you seen that Team of Rivals is Obama’s favourite book on politics as well? And now he has taken in a few rivals, too, not just Hill­ary Clinton, but Republicans.

AF: He’s right to do it, especially with the scale of the problems he’s trying to sort out. Do you remember, I think it was 1996 or 1997, and you and Tony were up in Manchester for a rally and we met up for a drink at the Midland Hotel? I remember saying to Tony, “So long as you can keep all your key people in the same room at the same time, you’ll be fine.”

AC: We were in the room where you said you signed Eric Cantona and Andy Cole [in 1992 and 1995, respectively].

AF: That’s right. Cantona – one of the best buys I ever made in terms of his overall impact. And that’s my point, in a way. He was a great footballer. Andy Cole was a great footballer. I’ve got some great players now. But nobody can do it on their own. It’s about the team. I can give the leadership and the direction but the team has to gel. That means keeping them together, able to live with each other in the same room, get the best from each other.

AC: The big difference in politics is that you can never really kick them off the team. If a footballer goes, he moves on to another club. The prime minister can sack a minister, but they can still hang around.

AF: So they have to be kept in the room somehow, too, in a different way to before.

AC: One of my worries at the moment is that we don’t see so much of the team. Too much of it falls on Gordon. I was thinking on the way here, listening to the radio, and Gordon was getting it in the neck over Royal Mail at the Policy Forum. If ever the shit hit the fan and we were looking for big hitters, there was a lot more than Tony – John Prescott, Gordon, Robin Cook, Donald Dewar, David Blunkett, Mo Mowlam, John Reid, Alan Milburn, Jack Straw, Charles Clarke, Peter Mandelson, Margaret Beckett, Tessa, Helen Liddell, Jack Cunningham, Pat Hewitt, lots of them.

AF: That’s right. The Tories and the media are into Gordon the whole time, like they used to be with Tony. The others should be out there much more, defending and promoting.

AC: I was telling the photographer before you arrived that I was amazed when I transcribed my diaries just how often you cropped up, particularly when the pressure was on. There’s only a few in the edited version, but during the campaigns and the tough times in particular, you were never off the phone.

AF: You know my definition of friendship – the real friend is the one who walks through the door when the others are put­ting on their coats to leave. You had some pretty difficult periods, and it was important you understood there was support out there. I know from my position here that sometimes there can be so much noise and fury going on around you that you need people outside your own bubble who can take a slightly different perspective for you. We all need that.

AC: There’s a bit where I talk about you being really excited about us getting rid of the Tories.

AF: I really enjoyed that run-up to the 1997 campaign. I was following it very closely and I think sometimes I could spot things going on that were worth passing on to you.

AC: Like saying we needed a masseur on the battle bus?

AF: (Laughs) Well, maybe that was a step too far. But the point I was making was that mental and physical fitness are two sides of the same coin. You have to build rest into any programme. That’s another thing that applies in all worlds, not just sport. I don’t think you can do high-pressure jobs now without being physically fit. And there were times I could see Tony was getting tired, and I was thinking he’s probably doing too much himself, not delegating, not spreading the load. So I’d phone up and tell you. But never mind my advice, I tell you the best bit for me in your book: it was near the end, when you were getting advice from Bill Clinton about Tony’s position – he was going through a really bad patch – and your own position, when things were really getting hot for you, with Iraq and the BBC and everything. I tell you, that was a political genius speaking. I learned something out of that. I read it several times over. His analysis was just so sharp, it was different class. Being able to analyse a situation and then decide what to do – that is such an important part of these top jobs. Reaching the right decisions under pressure.

AC: I suppose dealing with the media since it went 24/7 is another area affecting both sport and politics.

AF: Bloody nightmare. I think a lot of the live coverage of games is good and it’s brilliant that every single league game is record­ed on film. But the papers are a nightmare. They have all this space to fill, they’re under pressure from TV and the internet, the journalists are on short-term contracts and worried for their future but so much of what they write is just rubbish. I tell you, the press in our country are a real problem. They do real damage. I kept saying to you, the government needs to do something because it’s got worse not better. It’s a wonder anyone goes into politics with the stuff that gets thrown at them.

AC: You still don’t speak to the Beeb because of the stories they ran on [AF’s son] Jason, but why do you do all those press conferences?

AF: You have to. Part of the obligations before big games. It’s also a way of talking to the supporters, making sure they know what’s going on. It’s not a part of the job I particularly like, but you have to do it. I think it’s fair to say you and I have reached pretty similar views about the state of the media.

AC: No chance of you going into punditry when you retire, then?

AF: Not a chance. Some of the ex-player, ex-manager pundits are the worst. It’s a disgrace the way they sit there criticising guys they used to play with, just to make a bit of an impact. I couldn’t do that.

AC: Talking of retirement, do you have a date in mind yet?

AF: Not for a while. I’m 67 now. My health’s good. I still have the drive and the energy. I’ve been here more than 22 years, but I still get a buzz arriving at the training ground. I still get that tingle of excitement when the team bus draws up at an away ground before a big match. Or I see some of the young kids coming through, like the young Brazilian twins [United’s Rafael and Fabio da Silva] . . .

AC: They weren’t even born when you started at United.

AF: I know. Maybe they’ll be here after me, though.

AC: So what are we saying? Another year? Two?

AF: That kind of area. We’ll see.

AC: I reckon your last game should be at Wembley, the 2011 Champions League final. Then you do the UK football team for the 2012 Olympics.

AF: We’ll see. I certainly support the idea of an Olympic team in principle, provided there is no danger at all to the individual identities of the smaller countries. They have to be protected in terms of World Cup participation.

AC: I remember you once saying, a few weeks out from the first election, that it was like we were 2-0 up and we should let the Tories come at us, just probe them, let them make a few mistakes. So what do you think the Labour-Tory score is right now?

AF: Well, the polls aren’t great, are they? And a recession is the last thing you need when there’s an election not that far off. So you’d have to say the Tories are a goal or two up. But I don’t think it’s over. I might hear people complaining about the economy, or immigration, or Labour being in power too long, but I don’t hear too many saying they really want the Tories back.

AC: What about Gordon? What have you made of his premiership so far?

AF: Well, he’s been around a long time because he was such a big part of Tony’s government as well as leader of this one. And whatever anyone says about the economy and the recession right now, I think he did a terrific job as chancellor. And I know people go on about him being a dour Scot and not having Tony’s charisma and so on, but I think maybe the country needs a bit of that dour Scottishness. He has had some hellish problems thrown at him, and he’s handled them well.

AC: If Gordon was a footballer, where would he play?

AF: Central midfield.

AC: Tony?

AF: Striker.

AC: I would ask you about Cameron, too, but I think it’s fair to say normal politics has been suspended for a while.

AF: Yes, it’s just terrible what’s happened. You wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

AC: Was there ever a time you thought we would never get back in? [AC’s partner] Fiona’s dad used to have a mantra, that one day we’d be back, and sadly died before we made it. But I must admit there were times I doubted we ever would.

AF: I always felt eventually the country would turn against the Tories again. They’d done too much damage, in a way. And then when Tony came on the scene you just knew the guy had something. There was real enthusiasm for change then.

AC: But the polls are not good. Maybe the Tories think they don’t need to do much, just wait and let us do it for them.

AF: I think when you get closer to an election, people will think very long and hard. And again, if you’re talking about the read-across from politics and sport, I don’t think it’s ever enough to let the other side do it for you. You have to earn it yourself. So yes, the polls are not great, and the economic situation is not great, but it’s not game over, as I see it.

AC: What about Scotland? Are you worried about the Nationalists winning the argument on independence?

AF: Well, as you know, I never thought Alex Salmond would win last time, so I was wrong. I really hope they don’t win the argument. I feel very strongly that Scotland does better by being part of the UK.

AC: Christ knows how the credit-crunch fallout would have affected an independent Scotland. The Scottish banks have not exactly covered themselves in glory.

AF: I know, and I think it has unsettled people a lot. I think that if it came to a vote, Scots would stick with the rest of the UK. I certainly hope so.

AC: Now, even New Statesman readers probably like football, so a few football questions to end. Best player you ever saw?

AF: Pelé, di Stefano, Maradona, Cruyff.

AC: In that order?

AF: Yes, I think so.

AC: Greatest manager?

AF: Jock Stein.

AC: What is it about working-class Scots and management? Stein, you, Matt Busby, Bill Shankly, so many of the management greats seem to be Scots.

AF: I think we’re back to the values we grew up with in the kind of places we came from. Hard work. Teamwork. Strong beliefs. Jock was an incredible guy. I was manager at Aberdeen when he asked me to be his assistant with Scotland as well, so I had 18 months to see him close up. The two things I remember above all were his humility and his intelligence. He knew everything that was happening in Scottish football, everything. He knew about players I was looking at before I knew it myself.

AC: That must have been hellish, being alongside him the night of the Wales-Scotland match [on 10 September 1985] when he had his heart attack and died.

AF: Oh my God. You know, I said a few minutes earlier to the team doctor, “I’m a bit worried about the Big Man, he doesn’t look right” – and then the ref blows his whistle for something and Jock thought it was for the end of the game and he stands up, and that’s when it happened and I grabbed him. He was still alive then, but had a second heart attack later, and he died. He was a great man. I learned a lot from him.

AC: Who will replace you? And will you have a say?

AF: United is a family club and I know they will want me to stay involved as an ambassador of some sort. If I’m asked my view I’ll give it, but I won’t be a back-seat driver.

AC: And who do you fancy?

AF: I’m not gone yet.

AC: Reaction to [Liverpool manager] Rafa Benítez’s rant?

AF: Weird. I really don’t know what he was talking about. He’d obviously worked himself up into something, because he was reading it out. I’d be amazed if his staff or his players thought it was a good idea.

AC: Best (other) manager in the Premiership?

AF: You’d have to say Arsène Wenger, David Moyes and Martin O’Neill.

AC: Why did you only get one cap for Scotland?

AF: There’s no need to remind people of that. There was a glut of good Scottish strikers.

AC: Your United dream team, out of the players you’ve managed?

AF: Oh, there’s too many, even without Best, Law, Charlton, Edwards. What’s your Burnley dream team, then?

AC: Christ, it changes every time I do it. Beresford or Black-law in goal; Angus, Davis, Miller, Newton; Steven, Dobson, Coates; Morgan, Lochhead, James.

AF: 4-3-3? What about Adamson and McIlroy?

AC: Just before my time. My dad told me I saw McIlroy, but I was only four or something.

AF: I used to play with Andy Lochhead, at Drumchapel. Great header of a ball. My problem with United is I have had so many great players that I can’t do one dream team.

AC: Do two, then.

AF: Well, two goalies for sure – Schmeichel and van der Saar. Both top keepers. Full-backs, Denis Irwin, Gary Neville, Evra, and these da Silva boys are something else. Centre-backs you’d have to say Stam, Bruce, Ferdinand and Pallister. Ronny Johnsen was top drawer as well. Jonny Evans will be up there. For midfield . . . I ask myself who were the players you could not leave out. Bryan Robson for sure. Roy Keane. Scholes. Giggs – never, ever leave him out if I was playing my best team. Ronaldo and Cantona are both “never leave out” players. You’d have Beckham knocking on the door. Out-and-out strikers, where do I start – van Nistelrooy, Cole, Yorke, Solskjaer, Sheringham. As for Rooney, if I left him out, I’d have to do it by email or I’d never hear the end of it. God, when you go through it like that, I have been blessed with terrific players.

AC: Greatest achievement?

AF: The treble [Premiership, FA Cup and Uefa Champions League] in 1999, and in particular the comeback at Barcelona against Bayern.

AC: That’s in the book. You and your bloody knighthood.

AF: What a night. Can’t believe my own wife tried to stop it!

AC: Biggest mistake?

AF: Letting go of Jaap Stam. No question.

AC: Biggest disappointment.

AF: Not getting Gazza. He was a fabulous footballer and he would have done brilliantly here.

AC: Can you do the quintuple this year?

AF: No.

AC: Seriously?

AF: The thing about Cup football is you need to be the best, but you also need a lot of luck, and I think it’s asking too much for all the games to go your way. The one thing I will say is, this squad is the best I have ever had. Every game we play, I feel confident. At the moment, every attack fears our defence, and every defence fears our midfield and attack. That gives you confidence, but it is too tough a call, I think. That’s another read-across to politics, isn’t it? Confidence and momentum.

AC: Yeah. Best goal scored under you?

AF: Giggs against Arsenal at Villa Park [the 1999 FA Cup semi-final]. Out of this world. Let me ask you one. Best Tony speech?

AC: As a parliamentary speech, whether you agreed with him or not, you’d have to say his speech just before the war in Iraq. Best stand-up speech for me was the party conference, 1994.

AF: You mean he never got better after that?

AC: OK, Manchester, his last conference speech as leader.

AF: All the best things happen in Manchester.

AC: Three most important qualities required for leadership?

AF: Control. Managing change. And observation.

AC: What do you mean by observation?

AF: Spotting everything around you, analysing what is important. Seeing dangers and opportunities that others can’t see. That comes from experience and knowledge. What are your three?

AC: Being strategic. Being ahead of the curve, which I suppose is about change management. And getting the best from the people around you.

AF: Not that different to mine.

AC: Single most important attribute to a winning mentality?

AF: There’s two for me. A will to win. And attention to detail. You?

AC: I’d throw in fear of failure, too. I suppose that’s the flipside to will to win. Will you win tomorrow?

AF: Aye . . . should do.’

The last stretch tends to be the most emotional. In 2003 BBC commentator Brendan Foster had texted me to say the cameras were going to pick me out on the last half mile of the London marathon – yes, I run with a phone – so I forced myself to shed a few tears a mile or two short of that. Like many marathon runners, I was doing it for a cause, Leukaemia and Lymphoma Research, and in memory of a person, my best friend John Merritt.

In addition to all the emotion wrapped up in all the causes and memories being supported and recalled, marathon runners have all had to train for hours and hours, often alone. Most have endured moments of pain en route. Many have hit the wall, felt they could go on no longer, but somehow found the strength and resilience needed to keep going. And by the end the crowds are sharing in the sense of exuberance and achievement. So that last stretch of road is a very exciting, unified, happy place to be. Which makes it a very good place to disrupt with the view to terrorising the runners, the crowds and most of all the wider public and politicians. 

Before the 2003 London marathon, I was fully briefed on the security operation, because it came with Iraq as the dominant issue of the time. One or two people suggested I pull out. But the Met assured me they had everything under control. I ran with one of Tony Blair’s protection officers, but left him after a few miles, feeling the thrill of beating a fit copper was greater than any concern about security! You do think of things like terrorism when running, at least I did,  and you are conscious of what an attractive target these mass participation events would make. But there is something even more powerful than a bomb in a huge crowd of runners, and that is the power of the human spirit.

Terrorism, whether we like it or not, does make us think and act differently. I am writing this at Heathrow, where the security measures are a direct response first to Irish and now Al-Qaeda and other global terrorist organisations  There will be runners entered for the London marathon on Sunday perhaps having second thoughts. They shouldn’t. Those who do run will doubtless, amid the myriad weird and wonderful thoughts that flood into the mind as the 26.2 miles are ground out step by step, have the odd ‘what if?’ ponder about a bomb lurking nearby. All of which will add to the emotion at the end this time. None of which should stop them taking part, assured it will be one of the greatest feelings of their lives when they cross that finishing line.

What would he, as Prime Minister, be expected to do when the death of such an important public figure was announced, that he could not have done overseas? First, he would be expected to speak on behalf of the nation and, as he was like her a leader of the Conservatives, their political party. Second, he might be expected to make a call to the family. Third, to make sure all necessary arrangements were in place. All doable from anywhere in the world.

I know from my time in Downing Street that there are plans, kept under regular review, for the arrangements in the event of the death of senior public figures, like ex Prime Ministers and members of the Royal Family. I know too that the plans for Margaret Thatcher’s death were reviewed more than once since David Cameron became Prime Minister, and that in the event of her death during a Parliamentary recess, the guidance was clear there would be no recall of Parliament, and that tributes should be made in both Houses on the first day back. This is what happened when Jim Callaghan died, for example.

The Conservatives are supposed to believe in tradition and precedent. Yet Cameron decided to ditch both, tear up his own travel plans, and head back to London effectively to demand a recall of Parliament. He is now saying that this also had the support of The Speaker and Ed Miliband. The truth is it was hard for Ed Miliband to say anything but yes, Prime Minister, or fall into a trap that would have had the Right accusing him of tribally disrespecting a huge national figure. I understand that if the Labour leader had said No, The Speaker would have rejected the demand for a recall. Prime Ministers are rightly powerful people. Cameron used that power to make sure that what he wanted happened. His own chief whip was seemingly taken by surprise. The Speaker’s office instructed staff shortly after the death was announced that there would be no recall, because that was what their well rehearsed plans stated.

So we are left with the question – why? What was so urgent that these tributes could not wait until Parliament was back? And it is hard to escape the conclusion that as a politician, not as a national leader, Mr Cameron and his team saw some advantage. Perhaps, as has been suggested to me by a civil servant, he was worried that the many Thatcher worshippers on the Murdoch papers, the Mail, the Telegraph and the Express would turn their ire further upon him if he did not bow down in worship with them. Perhaps he felt some potential benefit in associating himself closely with a strong leader who, in death, was likely to have greater focus on achievements than failings. Perhaps he felt that this association would help him with his right wing which fears he is not a strong leader, and that his brand of Conservatism is shipping support to UKIP. Perhaps he thinks her presence back at the heart of national debate will help him with the difficult decisions ahead, on welfare for example.

Whatever the possible reasoning, the fact is that it is the break with tradition and precedent, the recall of Parliament, and the nature of the funeral arrangements – effectively a State funeral by stealth, without full Parliamentary approval – which have politicised the death in a way that was not necessary and risks becoming horribly divisive, that word so often associated with Mrs Thatcher’s style and policies.

That papers who have long believed she should have been sanctified have done so should surprise nobody. But Cameron should not have put himself in a position where it looks like he is joining in.

So whilst it is right and proper that MPs pay genuine respect to her strengths and achievements in Parliament today, and express sadness at her passing, it would be wholly wrong if MPs who disagreed with her policies and the impact of them upon their constituents and the wider world felt unable to say so.

There is something very peculiar about death in Britain. I heard the news of Mrs Thatcher’s demise in Scotland, and then spent several hours driving south listening to hour upon hour of glowing tribute. Colleagues of hers who, when I was a journalist, would happily confide how much she made their blood boil, queued to say how marvellous she was. Those who helped bring her down because she had become hugely unpopular with the public – the fact she was forced from office seems to have been little mentioned in the last two days – rushed to tell us how amazingly popular and in tune with public opinion she had been.

Nobody should speak ill of the dead, and the parties and dancing in the streets were offensive and misplaced. But nor should anyone condone hypocrisy, and hypocrisy comes when people say not what they believe, but what they believe they ought to say.

Partly this is about form, and about necessary respect for a dead person and that person’s family. But when it comes to political figures as important as Margaret Thatcher, I think there should be more balance in the assessment than has so far been coming through the media. Just as she liked a good argument, so she disliked hypocrisy, and it would do the Commons and her memory no good if today MP upon MP lined up merely to say how marvellous she was.

Of course, as a Conservative Prime Minister, David Cameron will and indeed should emphasise her strengths and achievements, and laud her memory for all it is worth. As Labour leader, Ed Miliband – who got the tone right on the day her death was announced – has perhaps a trickier task. He has to do all that too, but he must also reflect the reality that she was a divisive figure, and that her legacy is far from being an unalloyed success.

And frankly, if Parliament is to mean anything, on a day like today, MPs should not just be allowed, but should be expected, to say what they think, without the Tory and/or right-wing media hysteria that may emerge if they do not go along with the mood of the moment.

Many of my memories of her come from my time as a journalist covering her rise and fall. She was elected as I sat my finals at university. By the time she was gone I was political editor of the Daily Mirror, and in between times, I had followed her around the world, written about her with all the passion I could muster, working for a paper whose editorial line, in common with my own views, opposed so much of what she did. But as I said on Monday, she was one hell of a story to work on, and she was also one of the few real change Prime Ministers.

So yes she is a huge historic figure. And precisely because of that, even as the funeral is still being planned, there should be a proper and not sentimental debate about her.

There is a lesson for Labour in the broadly positive media and political response to her death. Tories never tire of talking up their past. This is not an act of vanity, but strategy. To have a generation unborn at the time of the Winter of Discontent still vaguely aware of it speaks volumes for the Conservative Party’s disciplined use of history as a political tool. To have a young generation today being bombarded with messages about how marvellous she was is good for the Conservative Party tomorrow; and they know it.

Labour, by contrast, has a habit of running down its own past and its own history. We have seen too much of that in recent years. Tony Blair won three elections, presided over the peace process in Northern Ireland, helped rid the world of murderous dictators like Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic, saved our schools and hospitals from remorseless decline under the Tories, delivered devolution, the minimum wage, ten years of growth and prosperity, Bank of England independence, Sure Start, on and on I could go. Yet to hear a lot of Labour figures, and the media echo chamber, his record was a negative one.

Margaret Thatcher was capable of making life difficult for her successors. But they never stopped talking her up. Partly because they felt she deserved it. But also because it was good for them.

I know I am not alone in being unsettled by the scale of the funeral arrangements, and, following on from the snub to Labour Prime Ministers at the wedding of William and Kate, the Royal presence. The Royals represent and embody the State. Politicians represent their parties and some get to lead their country. The case for a State funeral for Winston Churchill did not even need to be made. There is not a person alive who does not believe he helped to save the UK. But Margaret Thatcher’s role and record is not so clear.

David Cameron says she ‘saved the economy.’ But for many parts of Britain, people and communities feel she destroyed it, and abandoned families in her wake.

Yes, she can point to a historic role in saving the Falklands from Argentina, and even more significantly in working with Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev to end the Cold War and bring down the Berlin Wall. But her role in defending dictators like Pinochet, and her support for the apartheid regime in South Africa, deny her the right to be free from criticism on the foreign policy front. And some of that criticism, amid all the respect and sadness, must surely be heard in the Commons today.

I mentioned I was in Scotland when I heard she had died. Later that day, I was in Manchester for the football. There was quite a dissonance between the mood and reaction on the airwaves, and the things people were saying, the memories they were recalling, in those places. They are part of history too, and their anger and criticisms should not be airbrushed from it.

There is one other point I want to make. Yes, she was the dominant figure of her generation. Yes, Tony Blair shifted the Labour Party to the centre in part as a response to the success of her politics. And she may well have said, on being asked what her greatest success was, ‘Tony Blair.’ But she would never have devolved power to Scotland, (remember the poll tax?) brought in the minimum wage, taken the risks (and yes I understand why she hated the Republicans) needed to bring peace to Northern Ireland, etc etc. Tony once made a speech acknowledging her strengths and some of the necessary changes to Britain that she made. But he said too that she paid insufficient regard to the social consequences of her economic policies, that she did not invest sufficiently in schools and hospitals, and had a misguided and muddled approach on Europe. All true.

He hugely admired her strength. ‘God she is so strong,’ I recorded him saying in my diaries after one of her visits to see him in Downing Street. But a lot of what Labour did was to repair the impact of Thatcherism, not build upon it.

And if the Tory leaders who have followed her were being totally honest, they would admit there have been times when she has been their problem, not their solution. Remember that David Cameron felt he had to run not as the heir to Thatcher, but the heir to Blair, and indeed felt he had to invent the idea of The Big Society as a direct antidote to her – admittedly often misquoted – line that there is ‘no such thing as a society.’

So I stand by the only thing I have said so far – a short tweet on Monday, saying she was a great politician to follow as a journalist, and a real change PM (a tweet, incidentally, which led to me getting a fair bit of abuse from those who felt I was being too soft and soppy.)

But I do not resile from the many harsh words I wrote about her as a journalist, nor the way that we used her unpopularity, and her impact upon successive Tory leaders, to win three elections. Remember the poster that helped do for William Hague. A picture of him with Margaret Thatcher’s hair and a slogan … ‘vote Labour on Thursday, or they get in.’ It worked because whatever good Thatcherism did, it did a lot of bad too, and people did not want it back.

I respect Margaret Thatcher enormously as someone who knew what she believed and fought tirelessly to put those beliefs into action, through a life of public service. But it does her memory no good for any of us, least of all the MPs who speak today, to pretend there is only one side to the Thatcher story. Parliament should pay proper respect today. But all sides of that story should be told.

– To any football fan who fancies an interesting, neutral weekend away, take a look at the Bundesliga fixtures, and take a trip to Germany. For all the global hype of the English Premier League, if it is atmosphere at prices you can afford you’re after, Germany is the place.

Two very important factors have helped make their league the best-attended in Europe, with fantastic atmospheres at big matches: lower ticket prices is one; safe standing is the other. And it is time to take another look at making it happen here too.

Before the last election, I tried to get Labour to put safe standing into our manifesto. Some were keen, some were indifferent considering all the other priorities facing the country, and some were vehemently opposed.

This latter group included Andy Burnham, the sports minister at the time, which made it a non-starter. I do understand his reluctance. Burnham, an Evertonian, is from Merseyside and he has worked tirelessly on behalf of the families of those who lost their lives at Hillsborough. His was an understandable position.

However, now that a sense of justice for the 96 has finally begun to prevail, even with safety always paramount, it is possible to say the debate has shifted and can shift further.

Because the Hillsborough tragedy, which I wrote about for the Mirror Group as a journalist, was caused by fatal policing errors, flawed stadium design and fences. Standing wasn’t to blame. Standing can be done safely. And standing would make a difference for the better to football in Britain today.

I read recently that half the Football League has standing areas already or backs the Football Supporters’ Federation’s Safe Standing Campaign.

Some of the Premier League clubs get it and Aston Villa have been vocal supporters of the FSF’s Safe Standing Campaign along with Swansea City, Sunderland and the Scottish Premier League. West Ham United chairman David Gold has expressed his backing for safe standing too.

I’m pleased to say my club, Burnley, is heading in the right direction on safe standing, with chief executive Lee Hoos asking the government to permit a few small-scale trials to determine how it might work.

At our home game against Blackburn Rovers in December, the entire lower tiers of two home stands, and the whole of the away end, stood throughout the match. This happens week in, week out at many grounds across the UK and it’s about time leaders in the football industry pulled their heads out of the sand.

Yet the Premier League still won’t support safe standing and says: “Since the introduction of all-seater stadia … we have seen more diverse crowds attending Premier League matches including more women and children.”

Of course more diverse crowds are a very good thing – football shouldn’t just be a game for middle-aged white blokes. It’s a legitimate concern but I am not convinced by the Premier League’s belief that women and children would be scared off by standing areas.

The FSF’s 2012 survey was filled in by 4,000 fans, and one in every three female fans who completed it said they preferred to stand. Another third said they might do, depending on the game. And 85% of female respondents said they backed the choice to sit or stand.

In fact the underlying assumption that female fans will somehow be scared off by those boisterous boys in the standing corner is a bit patronising anyway. Plenty of women choose to stand too.

Sports minister Hugh Robertson argues that any change in legislation would require there to be “a very clear demand” from clubs and fans. I think the backing from fans is clear, both those who want to stand and those who want to sit. Both want a better atmosphere. Plenty of clubs make the right noises too, but they do not have the power.

Robertson and the Department of Culture, Media and Sport also say that there needs to be “very clear evidence that any such change meets stringent safety standards”. I don’t think anyone could possibly disagree with that. But how can clubs present “very clear evidence” if the government won’t permit a trial?

And of course there is plenty of “very clear evidence” in League One and League Two grounds every week. I have never quite got how standing is provenly safe for a League One club, but if they get promoted to the Championship, suddenly it is unsafe. Added to which, I couldn’t help noticing two ends standing when Peterborough played Burnley this year. Surely something is either safe or it isn’t.

Aston Villa say they would love to trial rail seated safe standing areas, and West Midlands police’s matchday commander agrees. Fans at the club want it too, but everyone’s hands are tied until the government gives the nod.

And remember: it is a coalition government. And one part of it, the Lib Dems, made safe standing official party policy in 2008. It is time they remembered that, and did something to bring it about.

Regardless of whether there’s political capital to be made out of the issue – and there might be some – it’s just the right thing to do. Every week, thousands of fans stand in seated areas that just weren’t designed for it. It’s not right and it’s not fair on those who would prefer to sit either.

Let’s be sensible about this and give fans and clubs the trials that so many of them clearly want.

My message for twitter is ‘I like twitter because it enables people to create their own media landscape. I hope it does not become too commercial.’ And here are my top ten, as just tweeted, with a short explanation for each one.

@optajoe – because I love football stats

@joey7barton – because not all footballers are boring

@johnprescott – the last generation of MP showing this

generation how to do it

@nomorepage3 – good campaign and it is going to win

@queen_hm – my favorite spoof

@kingswing72 – Elvis is Labour

@blairsupporter – relentless rebuttal of a lot of the ongoing bile re TB

@timetochange – slowly helping change people’s attitudes to mental illness

@guardiannews – quick with links

@schooltruth because she’d kill me if I didn’t (and because she is brilliant at debunking Goveology and promoting State schools)

Lots of other people were asked to list theirs and you can see their choices here.

It is with political strategist David Axelrod, a key member of the team for both of Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns; conducted by David Muir, a political strategist for Gordon Brown.

I got to know David well when I went back to try to help Gordon win the last election. We worked closely together in what was always going to be a difficult set of circumstances, not least because of the continuing impact of the global financial crisis. Through most of the campaign, I feared that the Tories would win an overall majority, and though defeat is always very painful, we took some satisfaction in helping to prevent that from happening. I remain confident Cameron can become an interesting historical oddity – a one term Prime Minister who never won an election and never had a majority.

But for all the poll leads for Labour, and for all the self-inflicted disasters this incompetent, misguided bunch of posh boys who don’t know the price of milk have created, there is still a huge amount of work to do before the election. And there is lot to learn from how Obama won second time around, and a lot to learn from Axelrod’s chat with David Muir.

A few key points to note.

… his emphasis on resilience, and keeping calm when things go wrong.

… his emphasis on teamwork and discipline, particularly important at a time these qualities are vanishing not just from the two parts of the coalition, but from within the Tory Party. We may have had our problems, not least between my old boss and David’s old boss from time to time, but the recent squabbles surrounding Theresa May, Michael Gove and now Boris Johnson, suggest nobody at the centre, and especially not Cameron, has a grip. Labour damaged itself in the past by people not hanging together when things got tough, as I said on This Week last night. That mistake must not be repeated.

… understanding the permanent gap between ‘inside the beltway’ opinion and real public opinion. His observation that conventional wisdom is almost always wrong is absolutely right.

… making your opponents’ mistakes and strategic mispositionings really damage them. Cameron and Co are providing so much ammunition at the moment. It really must be made to hurt them politically.

… and never forgetting that politics is about values and trying to change the world.

The economy of course is key. If George Osborne reads this interview, as I suspect he will, he will take out of it the idea that Obama won second time around by pinning blame for continuing economic problems on the Republicans, and therefore he and Cameron can win for the first time by pinning all the blame for Britain’s economic woes on Labour.

That has been at the heart of his strategy, and as I have said before, Labour has not done enough to push back on it. The crisis was created in Mr Axelrod’s country, not ours, and by economic and political forces of the right not the left, and whilst it was being created Labour governments presided over long periods of growth and rising prosperity. When the crash came, a Labour Prime Minister and a Labour Chancellor did the best of any of their counterparts in the world in steering the world  back on course. We need to start saying that more loudly.

For two years, the public has heard again and again that the Tories are having to clear up a mess left by Labour. Labour has to make sure that come the election, people realise that it is as a consequence of Cameron-Osborne economic strategic failure that their living standards have been hit so hard. The Bush-Obama message in this interview must not be allowed to be hijacked by Tory strategists.

Anyway enough of me. Here is the interview in full. Long, but worth reading.

It is hard enough campaigning for mental health services in the UK, where the government’s austerity programme means they are going to the back of the queue again, as psychiatric care is not quite as ‘sexy’ as cancer, children’s services or even accident and emergency. Recently I protested that two of the four emergency centres in Camden, North London, where I live, are closing. But compare and contrast with a country of 25million people, which has just three psychiatric hospitals, and just a dozen trained psychiatrists compared with 46,000 ‘traditional healers.’

That country is Ghana, in so many other ways one of Africa’s success stories. But they know that when it comes to looking after the most vulnerable people in their midst, they have a long way to go. On the day I visited one of those three hospitals, Accra psychiatric hospital, it was impossible to be anything other than shocked, but also in awe of the handful of doctors and the smartly dressed nurses doing their best in difficult circumstances. A children’s ward largely made up of mute, seriously disturbed youngsters, some of them dumped on the doorstep by their parents. A men’s ward where dozens of ‘ordinary’ patients mingled with dozens more sent by the courts for assessment, one of whom had been there since the ’80s on a murder charge. A women’s ward where new admissions mixed with women, some naked, others aggressive – there had been a murder three days earlier – for whom the hospital was likely to be ‘home’ for years to come.

Even using words like ‘ward’ risks giving an inaccurate picture. To a Western mind that conjures up shiny floors, beds with sheets and pillows, and machines humming. There was none of that. There were hundreds of patients and small teams of nurses doing their best to look after them. There seemed to be enough medication, but it was hard to imagine how the doctors and nurses could do much more than sedate and calm. On the day we were there, chief psychiatrist Dr Akwasi Osei, said he and a colleague might see as many as 75 patients individually, in between actually running the place, and acting as an advisor to the government. At a second of the three hospitals, Pantang, Polish-born doctor Anna Puklo-Dzadey, with 300 inpatients and around 100 outpatients daily, said they ran to stand still. ‘It is hard to do more than that.’

But the government is trying to move in the right direction. They have passed a Mental Health Act, which both Dr Osei and Dr Puklo-Dzadey say has the potential to transform services. ‘Implement the Act, implement the Act, implement the Act,’ says Dr Osei when I ask what one thing could make the most difference. Dr Puklo-Dzadey says ‘the Act is a great thing in that it shows they understand the need for change. But without the resources to make the change real, we will continue to run to stand still.’

The scale of the challenge, not just in terms of the services, but also attitudes, can hardly be overstated. ‘Even some doctors believe mental illness is contagious,’ says Peter Badimak Yaro, director of the mental health charity Basic Needs Ghana, ‘or caused by witchcraft, or sins in a past life. The reason there are so many traditional headers and so few real psychiatrists is that those attitudes are deep rooted in some parts of the country.’

At a Basic Needs self-help group for mentally ill women in Nima, Accra, we hear from schizophrenics who say they are shunned, and epileptics who say their problems are exacerbated by the fact that many think if you touch an epileptic, you will catch the illness. One after another, the women explain how the self-help group has given them a support network they lacked before. ‘We look out for each other, make sure we take our medication, feel stronger for knowing there are other people in the same situation,’ said Leyla Suraka, 53, a schizophrenic who went ten years without treatment.

Several have stories of the so-called prayer camps, where instead of medication and therapy, treatment is often made up of beatings, fasting, exorcisms and being tied to tree trunks to prevent escape. It will be hard to break down the attitudes, but again, the government is trying. Nana Oye Lithur, a human rights campaigner, has been appointed by the new president to a new position of minister for gender, children and social protection. She intends, as part of the social protection brief, to ensure the prayer camps are properly regulated and inspected.

‘Mental health has been neglected,’ she says. ‘The stigma and discrimination prevent people from accessing proper care. It will take time to turn it round, but we can.’

The small beginnings of one self-help group have now grown. There are 193 of them. Eight drama groups perform plays about the main mental illness to dispel some of the myths. But Basic Needs Ghana also provide direct support for the medical services people require, with more than 20,000 people having benefited from their work. I spent a morning at a polyclinic where men, women and children queued in the heat to see two nurses. It is basic care, but it is care nonetheless.

As to what this has to do with the good people of Britain, the answer is simple – you help to pay for it. Basic Needs Ghana, and the Mental Health Society of Ghana, are part funded by Comic Relief. As Red Nose Day comes around again, there will be the usual mix of extraordinary generosity, and cynicism about whether the money actually does any good. Compassion fatigue is perhaps inevitable when so many give so much to so many causes. But if anyone reading this feels the compassion fatigue setting in as the Red Nose films come across their screens, try to remember people like Memunata Sale, who was given money for a sewing machine so she could make clothes and earn what she needs to look after her sick father. People like Asibi Nabase, 39, who is visibly ill, but whose mother says she finds sanctuary in the self-help group meetings. People like Ernest Appiah, 38, who was rescued from a prayer camp, treated by nurses, and now has a job in a bank. People like Dickson Dorcoo, 63, suicidally depressive and so ashamed of mental illness that his wife felt she had to hide him away until she heard about the polyclinic. People like Sahara Jubila, 30, who needs regular medication to live sufficiently well with her schizophrenia to be able to look after her eight children, People like Leyla, in and out of hospital for years, but who has not been back for five years. People like Francis Pii Kugbila, who was chained to a tree for two years until Basic Needs Ghana found him, and is now back at work as a teacher. So think of the children he is teaching too.

Things are in Ghana – indeed across Africa – are changing for the better and not just with regards to mental health. Access to education, clean water and mosquito nets are all making fundamental differences to the way millions of people live. As Red Nose Day marks its 25th year, I’ve seen the good work that is being done with the money it raises. There is still a long way to go, but Pii now has a future to look forward to, partly in thanks to someone donning a red nose or wearing pyjamas to work.

Alastair Campbell is an ambassador for the Time to Change campaign.

Red Nose Day is back on BBC One on Friday 15 March, tune in from 7pm to watch Comic Relief – Funny for Money. To find out more go to rednoseday.com

On this, Mother’s Day, I thought I would give over my blog to the last of these three, whose blog suggests to me that she might follow me and her Mum down the journalism route after she has finished her studies. On verra.

She wrote the piece below for her own blog, farfromgrace.org, to coincide with International Women’s Day. (and if you scroll down a bit on her site, you will see a very nice piece she wrote about her own Mum and grandmother recently)

I quoted her on the gap between equal rights and equal worth at a panel discussion on International Women’s Day on Friday, where I made the point that women are too accepting, still, of male domination in politics, business and culture more generally. Feminism seems to have stalled a bit, and established power elites (not least here in the UK with our Bullindgon government, but also in the US via the right-wing Supreme Court) are re-asserting themselves. So it looks like it will be up to the next generation to rekindle the flames of a good old fight.

‘I was born 18 years ago, into a world where times are changing. The glass ceiling was said to have been lifted. For women like my mother, opportunities were lush compared to the drought of the last century. Supposedly, women had been granted equal rights. Unfortunately, I grew up to learn that equal rights do not guarantee equal value.

I found myself in a world where women were being objectified and scrutinised over their looks. My life was situated in a cell of media influence and imaging which was hard to escape. My eyes and ears feasted on this concept of the ideal woman. She is pretty, slim, and her silky hair falls effortlessly down her back. She watches me from billboards and magazine covers. When in doubt, the advice from the media is to be more like this ‘femme parfaite.’ But what am I if I am not and will never be this woman? What if I don’t want to be her? Is my life going to remain unfulfilled?

For a girl today, society is a confusing place. We are encouraged to aim high, yet our self esteem is conditioned to be low. We are educated that in this day and age we can go on to achieve anything a man can do, without the limitations that our ancestors were blocked by. Yet, when attempting to chase this ambition, we are reminded that we belong to the gender which is so greatly patronised by the media. This image of a sexualised woman means that we are introduced to the harsh truth that many men do not welcome women into powerful positions. To my sadness, there exist women who accept this as their fate because it is what they have learnt is acceptable.

This leaves young women wondering where they stand. How do we nurture our ambitions with the outer voices whispering that you’re ‘just a woman’?

Ambition is a value that has long been claimed by men. In this legally equal world, men are the leaders, while women are still expected to be the carers and even the aesthetical pleasers. Ours ear hear men speak, while our eyes watch and judge women.

I want to know where lies the voice of a girl. Who speaks for her? Women today are largely unrepresented throughout institutions which mould our society. When we look at Parliament, our government, the boards of major companies, or powerful figures in media and culture, it is hard to escape that we are still stuck in a man’s world.

Children grow up imitating the roles they see in their childhood. If this male domination remains, patriarchal values will be placed into the minds of our future leaders and powerful figures, meaning that change won’t come.

If we want to eliminate these inequalities, successful and powerful women need to be embraced and placed as role models.

Young girls go through years of seeking the perfection which is defined by the media. Unfortunately, this perfection doesn’t exist. We are all imperfect. Woman have flaws, just like men. However, the most tragic flaw which embodies millions of women, is the misunderstanding of their worth. There are many young girls who feel that this beautiful perfection is the only one worth seeking.

I don’t want future generations of girls to be plagued by the question of ‘what am I if I’m a woman?’ The answer to this questions is that being a woman should not make any difference to what you can achieve. Women and men have been granted equal rights so women will use it and move forward in this process of achieving true equality.

One day the term sexist will have died its death because we will no longer need to say this word aloud. Until then we must encourage women to ignore limitations and know their worth as a human being.

Happy international women’s day boys and girls!’