Michael Ancram, who has died aged 79, was an ambitious, popular, shrewd and effective Conservative politician who had the common misfortune throughout his career of either being the right man in the wrong place or of being there at the wrong time.
Although he rose to become chairman of the party and its deputy leader in opposition, he never made cabinet rank in government and was humiliated when he contested the leadership of the party during its wilderness years after the 1997 election.
