Sir George Gardiner, the former right-wing Tory MP who had a long-standing political feud with John Major, has died after a long illness. He was 67.
A committed and ardent Thatcherite, Sir George disagreed with the-then prime minister on most main political issues, particularly Europe and taxation. Famously, in a newspaper article, he described Mr Major as a ''ventriloquist's dummy'' - and as a result was deselected by his constituency party in Reigate shortly before the 1997 general election.
He quit the party and unsuccessfully fought the seat in that election as a member of Sir James Goldsmith's ill-fated Referendum Party. He did rejoin the Tories, although he did not fight another seat.
Sir George, who had suffered from heart and kidney problems for several years, died in the St George's nursing home, central London on Saturday night.
Although an old-fashioned supporter of Margaret Thatcher and deeply critical of those who failed to keep her torch blazing after her downfall, surprisingly he was given no ministerial posts by the Iron Lady while she was prime minister.
He believed that only a right-wing agenda could keep the Conservatives in power. He underlined this point in numerous, trenchant newspaper articles in which he occasionally warned that the Tories were ''staring into the abyss of defeat'' or ''committing suicide''.
His parliamentary ''career'' began in the press gallery of the House of Commons, as chief political correspondent for a series of provincial newspapers. As a result, when he was a member of the House he knew exactly what the media wanted from him, and regularly issued short, pithy, sometimes dramatic statements that found their way into the public prints.
One of his earliest, and possibly he would consider his greatest, achievements, was his role in Mrs Thatcher's victory over Edward Heath in the Tory leadership contest of 1975.
Sir George acted as her
second-lieutenant in that campaign in which he exploited his campaigning skills to the full.
Despite remaining on the back-benches throughout her years of power, he was an influential and active back bencher. He was a member of the executive, a powerful repository of Tory parliamentary back-bench opinion, of the 1922 Committee, which comprises all Tories in Parliament except those with ministerial office when the party is in power.
However, in 1994, Sir George had a bizarre run-in with John Major following his increased criticism of that administration.
Mr Major wanted to secure his removal as chairman of the influential right-wing 92 Group of Conservative MPs. Only a month before the election for this office took place, Sir George led a deputation to No 10, demanding an early Cabinet reshuffle. They were sent away in minutes humiliated ''with a flea in their ear'', and in his memoirs, Mr Major described Sir george as ''a viper slithering around in the parliamentary pit''.
However, to Mr Major's fury, Sir George was re-elected as chairman, easily defeating the candidate who had the prime minister's blessing.
Kenneth Clarke, the-then chancellor, also felt Sir George's wrath when he spearheaded a campaign to oust him, saying he should toe the government line on tax cuts or quit.
After the Church of England's decision to allow the ordination of women, to which he was bitterly opposed, Sir George became a Roman Catholic.
Born on March 3, 1935, Sir George was educated at Harvey Grammar School, Folkestone, and Balliol College, Oxford. He served as chief political correspondent on Thomson Newspapers from 1964 to 1974, and unsuccessfully contested Coventry South for the Conservatives in 1970.
MP for the Surrey Tory stronghold of Reigate from 1974 until 1997, he concen-trated his activities on economic affairs, privatisation and southern Africa.
He was the author of a book about his idol entitled: Margaret Thatcher: from Childhood to Leadership, 1975.
Sir George first married Juliet Wells in 1961, which produced two sons and a daughter. He was married a second time, in 1980, to Helen Hackett.
