A working class heró who could? be punchy, proud... but never dull

JOHN Prescott was the bruiser who cried when watching Billy Elliot.

- Jason Beattie

He was the Jaguar owner who led the fight against climate change.

And he was the brawler who spent much of his time acting as a peacekeeper between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

The Labour giant may have been a jumble of contradictions but he was also a larger-thanlife character in an age of identikit politicians.

While other Cabinet ministers left their personality at the door, Prescott was unapologetically Prescott.

Few politicians could connect with voters as well as he did - even if that connection was sometimes made with a swinging fist.

He was once asked how he would like to be recalled. "As an aggressive bugger," he replied, perhaps in a nod to his Two Jabs nickname.

He feared he would be best known for the punch he threw at agricultural worker Craig Evans in the 2001 general election campaign.

But Prescott will be remembered for far more than his boxing skills.

His life was far richer than that and his contribution to British life far greater.

He was a much misunderstood man but also a much underestimated man.

The journey that took him from hardship to becoming Deputy Prime Minister and then a seat in the Lords began in Prestatyn, North Wales, in 1938. When Prescott was four the family moved to Rotherham in Yorkshire after his father, also John, got a job as a railway signalman.

The young Prescott had hoped to go to the local grammar school but failed his 11-plus.

The chip on his shoulder, he recalled in his autobiography, Pulling No Punches, only "got greater after that".

With no career plan and uncertain about what to do with his life, he left school at 15 to work as a trainee chef and then as a waiter for the Cunard Line.

Years later, Tory MPs would shout "garçon" across the Commons chamber in reference to his previous job. This was the sort of prejudice that accompanied him in his political life.