Island Life Magazine Ltd August/September 2011 | Page 18

ANDREW TURNER MP The Riverside Centre, The Town Quay, Newport IW [email protected] TEL: [phone] A tribute I usually spend Monday mornings in meetings on the Island, then head up to Westminster before Parliament sits in the afternoon. But on July 4, I caught an early train following an invitation from the American Ambassador to attend the unveiling of a statue. Westminster City Council had made an exception to their rule that ten years must pass after somebody’s death before they will permit a statue. Former American President Ronald Reagan died in 2004, aged 93. This year would have been his 100th birthday and the 10ft-high statue, outside the American Embassy, forms part of the commemorations. Younger readers may not realise the part President Reagan played in changing our world. The Cold War (which lasted from the mid-1940s until the fall of the Soviet Union) was a constant presence throughout my childhood. It seems incredible today that youngsters were told to hide under wooden desks in the event of a nuclear attack, but some will remember practising that exercise in their classrooms. The Reagan Doctrine increased diplomatic and economic pressures on the Soviet Union. As a result Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev 18 www.visitislandlife.com to an inspiring man introduced the reforms of ‘perestroika’ (reconstruction) and ‘glasnost’ (openness) into a stagnant economy in the mid-1980s. However, that wasn’t enough to save the USSR which collapsed in 1991, leaving the USA and its allies as the dominant militant force in the world. Ro nald Reagan was sometimes ridiculed by political opponents because of his former career as a TV actor. But at 69 he was the oldest person ever elected to the presidency - he had seen the world and learnt the value of building strategic relationships. Whatever your politics, it is impossible to deny that this former film star changed the history of the world and he was a staunch and loyal friend to the UK. The historic special relationship between our nations thrived under Ronald Reagan and Margaret (now Baroness) Thatcher. The impressive statue has an inscription on its plinth, a tribute from Margaret Thatcher. It reads, "Ronald Reagan won the Cold War without firing a shot". That is an impressive public epitaph and I am sure Reagan would have been proud. But there were also reminders that he was a self-effacing man, devoted to his wife and family and whose public life was guided by his deep religious faith. I never forget it is a real privilege to be the Island’s MP, and I really felt that sitting in Grosvenor Square on Independence Day. I was filled with admiration for the man who did more than anyone to save us from Soviet nuclear missiles – because I have a hunch that hiding under my school desk wouldn’t have worked!