My cousin Ian Taylor, who has died aged 76, devoted his life to the service of Bournemouth Labour party and Fabian Society.
He joined the party at the age of 16. Within months he was elected as assistant secretary for Bournemouth East. He recounted how this was in effect a “mugging”, as he was now required to address by hand the literature envelopes for every voter in the constituency, some 60,000. He completed this task and later became secretary, a post he held for 18 years.
Soon after 2000 he arranged the successful merger of the two constituency parties in Bournemouth, and so helped enable the continuation of an effective party administrative presence in the area and an increasing share of the vote for Labour in recent years. Ian was a superb organiser and an assiduous communicator who could be relied on to see through everything he undertook. He was secretary of Bournemouth District Fabian Society for over 40 years.
Born in Bournemouth, Ian was the son of Stephanie (nee Hollyman) and Pat (Philip) Taylor, a hotel waiter. He was educated at St Andrew’s primary school and Portchester boys’ school, and gained A-levels at evening classes. After working for a local firm of solicitors, at the age of 27 he was accepted by Reading University as a mature student. A law degree there was followed by a PGCE teaching qualification at Brunel University.
He became a lecturer in business studies at Basingstoke College, followed by a post at Southampton University, and then in 1997 he joined Bournemouth and Poole College of Further Education as lecturer in law, business and finance. He taught daytime and evening classes for academic and skills-based courses and assumed a pastoral role, guiding many young people to success in their studies, enabling them to gain university entrance, as he had done.
At the age of 65 he faced unwanted compulsory retirement, despite new legislation. He left his post and with the aid of his trade union fought and won an early case of age discrimination, an achievement of which he was very proud. He subsequently obtained employment supervising students at local language schools and at Bournemouth University.
Ian stood as a Labour party candidate for Bournemouth council many times, always unsuccessfully. In 1987 he was the Labour parliamentary candidate in Bournemouth East, receiving nearly 6,000 votes. Subsequently he was delighted to receive a free subscription to the House, the magazine for MPs. He had been confused with another Ian Taylor. “Now I can learn what they are up to,” he said.
Ian is survived by his sister, Theresa, two nephews, a niece and two great-nephews.
