Wilson’s spin doctor: One of us must be a liar. You’ll have to decide who
THE document published today by The Mail on Sunday is authentic, a real list, written in what is undoubtedly Marcia’s handwriting on the notepaper which led me to call it the Lavender List. I saw an earlier draft on the same paper in 1976, but it contained many of the same names. Forty years later, I stand by my assertions that the most notorious of those names were of Marcia’s choosing. Of course, many of them would have been included by Harold Wilson anyway, such as his personal driver, Bill Housden. Others, however, I still insist, were clearly Marcia’s. Property tycoon Eric Miller, for example. In the early 1970s, he had begun contributing money to the secret trust which was created to finance Wilson’s political office. Albert Murray, one of Wilson’s closest aides, told me he was present at Chequers when half a dozen prominent businessmen, nearly all later honoured, were asked to pay £1,200 each into the fund and Miller proposed the sum should be higher. Miller was close to Marcia and there was even speculation the pair might marry, although he was already married. Marcia, to put it mildly, was emotionally attracted to him. Joe Kagan received a peerage and he helped Marcia personally. After the birth of her two children, she bought a house in Wyndham Mews, in the wealthiest part of London; she was assisted financially in moving there by Kagan. He stayed in the list despite the fact that I warned Wilson he was being investigated for tax fraud.
Most curious of all, the most notorious absentee in this version of the list is James Goldsmith. Wilson told both Lord Donoughue and me, separately: ‘Why should I give him anything? I hardly know him.’ Wilson later told me Goldsmith intended to offer Marcia a directorship.
The inclusion of Will Camp on this list – subsequently crossed out – is astonishing. He acted as an unofficial adviser to Wilson during the 1970 Election after being recruited by Marcia, but his contribution was abysmal. Wilson had no regard for him.
It is also interesting that neither Donoughue nor I was included. Given our seniority, only Marcia’s hatred of us could have kept our names off. I was offered a peerage or knighthood by Wilson four days before he finally resigned, and refused, as did Donoughue.
Marcia claims that my story about Wilson telling me Marcia informed Mary that she had been to bed with him six times was invented as a sexist smear.
Either I did invent it, or she is lying. One of us is lying – or alternatively, Harold Wilson went home to play draughts with his wife and came back to give me a story which was more colourful. Because there is no documentary proof, you’ll have to decide who you believe.