Charles Stewart is a man who has faded into the shadows recently. The 18
th
Earl of
Galloway was once Prime Minister for just 25 hours, but in those 25 hours, his supporters and critics both agree, there was never a clearer insight into the political culture of 10 Downing Street and the wider establishment in the United Kingdom. In his recently published biography, ‘How I See It’, Charles – Lord Galloway according to British protocol – gave his own account on how he came to leave office quicker than he spent attempting to seek it. Charles also lifts the light on what truly happened surrounding Samuel Faith and his departure from office, although many – including Charles – have been seen to indicate that there was more to it than his brief summary. Despite Charles’s political prominence and – some may say – prominent downfall (his death was faked and he subsequently lived in exile in Kenya – a British court later cleared him of foul play as he put forth a case to suggest he was endangered), he remains a relatively unknown figure on the international scene and even in his own country of Britain. What better way to get to know the man than to visit him at his home from home, Florence House, in Kenya, an estate constructed by the 15th Earl of Galloway in the 1920s, also a controversial politician and also named Charles. Despite only being built in the 20s, the inside resembles more that of a somewhat Elizabethan property – explained by the fact that William Stewart, once President of the United States (the son of the 15th Earl of Galloway and grandfather of the present) had a keen romanticism that lead him to attempt to reconstruct what he saw as good. On arrival, I am greeted by the former British Prime Minister, but he comes across more a kind-hearted caretaker than the man who so many accuse of being authoritarian and hard to access. He goes by the name Charles Galloway or, for official purposes, his title of Lord Galloway. What is clear is that Galloway likes his privacy, hence his love for the Kenyan estate built by his great-grandfather, where he can chose who he permits at his court.
The main façade to Florence House, Kenya (left), and the main drawing room (right).
When we sit down in the Earl’s Kenyan drawing room, filled with artefacts of the past, it becomes clear that he also shares the sentimentality of his ancestors. On his mantelpiece is a picture of his parents’ wedding (Henry Stewart, 17th Earl of Galloway – also, coincidentally, an exceptionally short-serving Prime Minister, and Lady Anna Russell, a daughter of the 13th Duke of Bedford) and a picture of himself as a schoolboy, he was at Eton like so many of the British establishment, aged about 16. As I prepare to ask Lord Galloway the first question, I
spot a two parallel piles of around 30 unopened letters neatly stacked – it’s clear he is a wellsought after man with a nonchalance. ‘If they’re important, they’ll write again,’ says the Earl, looking out of the window onto the planes, somewhat a chip off the old block from his late father. ‘Charles, tell me, why did you leave?’ I asked innocently, having read his biography but pretending not to have. ‘I was forced out,’ he tells me as he leans closer with a conspiratorial look on his face, ‘If you don’t please the powers that be, that’s it, you’re gone.’ He pauses before continuing, ‘However powerful the figureheads may seem on the outside, their real power is – and always has been – drawn from the appeal to a status quo ante. Sometimes that status quo has been beneficial and has enabled the person to govern effectively, but in my case that status quo was negative and my rejection of it was the main cause of my downfall. I was either going to be deposed or I could one up them by leaving… I had no other choice.’ So we see instantly what lies at the heart of Charles Stewart’s politics: a distrust for the establishment of today. ‘It seems ironic that you should be forced out given that you rose to power by forcing out your predecessor Samuel Faith’. To this the Earl replied, ‘Definitely… but that’s politics for you. I had underestimated the great power of the establishment when it came to being able to sway public opinion in or against your favour. Samuel Faith was a principled man and, what many people do not know is, he had been a good family friend – and is ironically now my neighbour in the Scottish Borders. My main disagreement with Samuel stemmed from my time in charge of the Home Office, but that is for another day. The point is, I was the figurehead for a movement that deposed Samuel Faith, then Prime Minister, and was deposed myself by a movement more powerful than the one that had brought me to power. The motive of my enemy movement was the same as in every political situation: a distrust of someone who was going to change the way things had been done around here.’
Charles Stewart pictured with his father, Henry Stewart, who was once the shortest serving British Prime Minister before his son broke his record.
When asked does he not see some sort of hypocrisy in criticising the establishment as an Old Etonian, Oxford educated aristocrat whose family have had close ties to the royal family, Charles replied, clearly having been asked this question many times before, ‘The difference is that my sort of person represents the old establishment. I was deposed by what has become the new establishment and the sort of values the two worlds stand for are completely opposed to each other. My world stands for benevolence, pragmatism and effective politics whereas their world is purely focused on getting their own way. In many ways, there are many similarities between myself and Samuel Faith – we were both representing the views of a Britain that had previously excelled in a Britain that was going in the wrong direction and we both had new and radical ideas about how to govern the country. Whatever your views on me and your rise to power are, you cannot argue that the politicians of today are as power-hungry as the politicians of time gone by. The difference is that the way in which that power will be exercised, and today’s politicians haven’t got the faintest clue how to exercise such power because they do not come from a political culture as I and my contemporaries do… they come from a culture of having watched these things on TV and wanting to be the main star of the show. That’s a bad culture if you ask me.’ Charles, who is no longer tied to any political party, officially sits in the House of Lords as a crossbencher (that’s a peer without a party) but has seldom attended any sessions now preferring to keep a low profile. Charles tells me that he’s part of a larger movement of people who seek to return Britain to its old ways – ‘when things worked’ he says – and is currently working on the boards of many organisations who seem to agree with his values. He has become somewhat of a household name in the British film industry at present, having acted as the screen-writer for a whole series of short films to make up a documentary on the decline and fall of the old British establishment. Charles also has contracts from publishing companies to publish many unpublished books relating to the politics and culture of the United Kingdom. He is currently working on a history of the hereditary peerage and the hereditary principle in nature. Whilst he may not be in the limelight as much as he used to be or as his family typically have been, Charles Galloway is a man of great influence. Despite his family’s long-held pretence to be poor, he is one of the most asset-rich landowners in the United Kingdom, owning a great estate in the Scottish Borders. He also owns this vast Kenyan estate where we have the interview, a London townhouse (many great aristocrats had to sell their London residences) in one of London’s most expensive postcodes and a French ski-lodge with its own land that he bought through his father’s sale of the family’s Belgrave Square house. Charles has additionally been named as the 50% heir to the fortune of his mother’s family, the Dukes of Bedford, who own London’s Bedford Estate – the largest landowner in Bloomsbury. As well as this, his political achievements – however long-lasting or controversial – have given him a platform to be able to air his views. ‘I have come to realise that being in politics is not quite the right way to achieve things. Of course, politics has its usefulness, but to me right now our culture is the most important thing, and I hope to influence that through the publication of educational content such as films, books and in protecting our history as President of the National Trust. The politicians of our country have an important role to play – should they elect to do something good for once – in our development as well, but I think my skills are best put to use elsewhere for now.’ The Earl did not rule out a political comeback, but was keen to affirm that for the moment he would
rather continue on as he is… living a quiet life whilst seemingly holding a lot of cultural influence. As our interview drew to a close, Charles concluded, ‘But don’t believe what I’ve told you purely because I’ve said it. Look in the history books and public archives and you will see that what I am saying is closely aligned with the truth.’ There you have it. The man largely seen as the ‘unready Prime Minister’. Charles Stewart may not be a particularly public figure at the moment, but his intellect and potential influence should not be underrated.