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Camden New Journal - By DAN CARRIER
Published: 7 June 2007

Michael Scott

Re-think on Scott blue plaque snub

MEMBERS of a quango who rejected a bid to put up a plaque to a Primrose Hill anti-apartheid campaigner have agreed to reconsider their decision following pressure from the New Journal.
Lewis Chester, biographer of the Reverend Michael Scott, asked English Heritage’s blue plaque panel to mark the King Henry’s Road home of the campaigner who spent his life fighting for civil rights and battling against racism and inequality in South Africa and this country.
But the idea was dismissed as the panel did not accept Mr Scott was as well known as another anti-apartheid campaigner, Bishop Trevor Huddlestone, who has not yet had a plaque tribute. They felt it would not be proper to approve a Scott plaque.
Last week, Mr Chester sent key committee members – including actor Stephen Fry and historians Professor David Cannadine and Dr Margaret Pelling – a dossier packed with information about the life and times of Mr Scott and New Journal articles on the issue.
Now, an English Heritage spokesman has confirmed the committee, meeting next week, is to re-think its decision.
He said: “The views of Lewis Chester, including coverage in the Camden New Journal newspaper relating to the case of Michael Scott, will be reported and discussed at the next blue plaque panel meeting, which will take place on June 13.”
Board members were remaining tight-lipped this week about the chances of the decision being reversed. Dr Pelling said she had received the dossier, but was not able to comment publicly on her thoughts.
She said: “I am not supposed to speak about this. I have replied to Mr Chester, but we have a convention that is similar to the Cabinet’s collective responsibility.”
Mr Chester said: “I was utterly astounded by the panel’s decision not to honour Scott with a blue plaque on the grounds of his ‘insufficient stature’. Scott’s unique contribution to 20th-century race relations was not adequately assessed or appreciated by the blue plaque authorities.
“As things stand, an injustice is being done to the memory of Michael Scott and, incidentally, to that of Trevor Huddlestone.”

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