COUNCILLOR Agnes McLean, the Strathclyde region woman's rights

campaigner who became a celebrity after dancing to Latin American

rhythms in a BBC documentary film made in Cuba, has died in the Southern

General Hospital, Glasgow.

Councillor McLean, who was 73, was the member for Glasgow's Central

and Calton ward and suffered a stroke 10 days ago.

A regional councillor for 12 years -- she was previously on the former

Glasgow Corporation -- Councillor McLean was born in Scotland Street,

Ibrox, and remembered John MacLean visiting her home, something which

probably influenced her lifelong work first as a communist and then as a

socialist activist for workers' rights.

She started work at 14 as a bookbinder in Collins before going on to

the shop floor at the Rolls-Royce aero-engine factory at Hillington.

Councillor McLean was a wartime crane driver who fought for trade

union recognition in 1941 and equal pay in 1943. She spent 36 years with

the company for many of which she was a leading shop steward. She

retired at 55 to look after her mother.

Councillor McLean travelled as a representative of the World

Federation of Trade Unions, attending conferences in many capitals.

Some years ago she was awarded the Trades Union Congress gold badge,

the highest honour then given to a rank and file trade unionist, in

recognition of her work.

Councillor McLean, who never married, once had a childhood ambition to

be a ballet dancer. But she could never have foreseen that it was her

love of dancing that would make her known well beyond the boundaries of

Glasgow and the West of Scotland.

She achieved celebrity status when she took part in a television

programme for BBC Scotland's Ex-S series called In Cuba They're Still

Dancing. The film won a Bafta award and only two weeks ago it was

reported that the producers wanted her for a new series of dance

programmes.

Councillor McLean, who was deselected at a ward meeting in March, was

a member of many outside organisations including the Scottish Opera

Advisory Council and the Theatre Royal Board of Management, as well as

Glasgow Association for Conference and Tourism Services, and Blindcraft

Scotland executive development council.