George Galloway interview/feature (The Scotsman)

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Interview: George Galloway
Catherine Deveney
23 November 2010
scotsman.com

THE good thing about interviewing George Galloway is that he never knowingly undersells the drama of a crisis. That grandiose eloquence (who else uses words like "popinjay" and "indefatigability"?), the colourful imagination, the instinct for dramatic effect – wow he's a good performer. It always seemed such a waste when the former MP for Hillhead got chucked out of the Labour Party and ended up fronting Respect in Bethnall Green; a potential leading man languishing in bit parts. His life is like a thriller: death threats, physical attacks, high-profile enemies (including the state of Israel), security bans from Canada for being a "terrorist". As if that's not enough, he launches into a mysterious tale of an anonymous stalker, whose only trace of entry into his London home was a bottle of expensive gin and a gay DVD. (Galloway doesn't drink and he isn't gay, he assures me.) He may have lost his seat at the last election but he hasn't lost his nose for a good tale.

And now he's back. From outer space. (As that old song says.) We should have changed that stoopid lock, we should have made him leave his key … Yes, like an old flame, Galloway is set to woo us all over again for a seat in the Scottish parliament. Our new political squeezes, he reckons, sport a dowdy plumage next to his peacock finery. "I think there's a need for bigger, deeper people with more of a track record, more of a political grasp. Alex Salmond is an extremely talented person but he gets a completely free ride in Scottish politics because of the paucity of the Labour leadership. Scottish politics has a void at its heart, particularly since Tommy (Sheridan) imploded. There was clearly public support for a left-of-centre alternative and that gap has now opened up."

Galloway, whose political career has been defined by his pro-Palestinian links, will stand for Respect, having been expelled from Labour in 2003 for his stance against the Iraq war. (In typical Galloway spirit, never using a dull criticism when a colourful insult will do, he likened Blair and Bush to "wolves" and encouraged British troops to disobey orders.) Talking to his ex Labour colleagues, hostility clearly remains. "Some in the party will never forgive him," says one. There is also resentment at the idea that Galloway sees himself lighting up the parliament's sky like a shooting star while the rest of them provide the dull glow of energy-saving bulbs. Holyrood is not Westminster, his old colleague warns. You only speak for six minutes and the committee work is a slog.

But Galloway also attracts admiration for his undoubted political abilities. "He is smart enough to come and speak on anything. I've never seen George bested in an argument. He was brilliantly gifted but he had a self-destruct button." "He is incredibly charismatic," agrees another, a senior Labour figure who thinks Galloway could win the 10,000 votes necessary for election to Glasgow's regional list. "He's a captivating speaker who's had the bottle to back unpopular causes. The Scottish parliament is dying on its feet and someone like George wouldn't be a bad thing." He trusted Galloway, then? "Not for a minute," he laughs. "But he'll probably make it more interesting."

The arrangements with Galloway are to be made via a journalist friend of his. I suggest 10:30am at a hotel's café bar which should be quiet. "George doesn't drink." Yes, I know. I'm suggesting coffee not a mid-morning bottle of Macallan. Okay, it's just George doesn't drink. I'm puzzled by this insistence. Neither do I, but I don't feel the need to emphasise it. Anyway, I'm obviously meant to report it so there we are – job done. When I arrive half an hour early, he's having breakfast. I tell him I won't interrupt but show him where I'll be sitting when he's ready. I would have thought no more about it, except he says: "Oh, I thought we'd breakfast together. But I was too hungry to wait." Yeah, thanks George. He smiles charmingly, like a small boy caught in the cookie jar.

It reminds me of my absolute favourite story of Galloway's chutzpah in his – extremely – extensive cuttings file. In his early political days in Dundee, he travelled to London with a colleague. Galloway offered to take the man's bag because he had a lift to the station. Very helpful, except by the time he got to the train, his colleague claimed, Galloway had eaten the sandwiches from his bag. He nicked his pal's sandwiches? "Haven't heard that one before," says Galloway, unamused.

Galloway was the eldest of three children, with a younger brother and sister. His mother, who is still alive, was of Irish descent and worked as a school cleaner, in a fish factory then Dundee's hat factory. Her father was an illegitimate son in the well-to-do O'Reilly family. "I am actually related to Sir Tony O'Reilly, the newspaper magnate – but that doesn't entitle him to any of my money," jokes Galloway.

Galloway's own father, who died in 1997, was an active trade unionist, and a big influence. "He was a genius to be honest. No university education but he built a car, could build stereos – he could turn his hand to anything." An electrician, he then worked for NCR before retraining as a teacher when he was made redundant. "He was very shy and none of us ever thought he would stand in front of a class but he did." Not a firebrand like his son, then? "No, no. My father used to have to smoke a cigarette before asking someone for directions." Galloway was more like his mother, "though I am not exactly what you think I am".

He is not, he says a little awkwardly, as gregarious as people imagine. "Between the age of nine and 12 I wore a black patch over my left eye and therefore I felt everybody stared at me. A lot of people remarked, shouted, and that left me with a real thing about people staring. I don't have difficulty talking to big crowds and I don't mind people looking with a smile on their face, but if someone stares in a neutral way, they unnerve me."

He joined the Labour Party at 13 after being given "a shiny half crown and an application form" by a local MP. Despite being good at school, his political idealism made him favour factory work over university. Then he worked in the local Labour Party office, where a young Palestinian man changed his life.

"Think of the Turkish word 'kismet'," he says. Destiny. He was running off leaflets on an old Gestetner when the Palestinian arrived. All the officials were out. Galloway had to do. "He described the Palestinian situation in such a way that by the end of the encounter I was hooked." Galloway didn't see him again for the next 21 years and assumed he had died until the man whispered in his ear in a crowd in Jordan. Why hadn't he been in touch? "I was embarrassed," the man told him. "I became a multi-millionaire building magnate in the United Arab Emirates."

Galloway always said he wanted to be Foreign Secretary but was too outspoken, having to content himself with informal diplomacy. He was considered far too deferential to Saddam Hussein. Was he? "I only met him twice." He was polite – as he would have been to president Bush. What did he feel when Saddam was executed? "I thought it was an act of senseless barbarism, made no less barbaric by the fact that he himself would have sent many people to the gallows. I believe only God has the right to take lives. The people who murdered him made him ten times taller than he would have been if they'd locked him up. He was 69 – how much longer would he have lived?"

That's his political stance. What did he feel personally? "He wasn't what journalists would like me to say. He wasn't bombastic with a crushing handshake. He listened more than he spoke." What did that prove? People who are capable of terrible acts don't have evil stamped across their foreheads. "No that's right. George Bush doesn't have evil stamped across him but he's an evil person," he retorts.

He has campaigned against Saddam's Catholic deputy prime minister Tariq Aziz being sentenced to death. "I am very upset the Vatican hasn't done more." Hasn't it made a statement? It's not enough, says Galloway, a Catholic himself. Why should the Vatican intervene for someone who perpetuated a murderous regime when it doesn't seek clemency for less influential people? "Because it's un-Christian to execute someone. And because he is the most prominent Catholic in any Arab country." It's an irony of the Iraq war; more people are tortured post Saddam, and Catholics are now attacked and murdered.

But it's not just ideological controversy that has trailed Galloway. Financial investigations have been conducted into War On Want, the charity he was general secretary of in the 1980s; the Mariam appeal, an anti-sanctions campaign that centred on raising money for an Iraqi child with leukaemia to be treated in Britain; and more recently, into his Gaza aid programme, Viva Palestina. He has always been cleared, and he won a major case against the Telegraph newspaper after it ran a story implying Galloway had received money from the Iraqi Oil For Food programme.

His finest hour was in the US senate, wiping the floor with his interrogators who made similar claims. (He rather spoiled this gravitas by subsequently going into the Big Brother house and pretending to be a cat while dressed in a leotard – and he knows it. He refused £250,000 to return recently for the programme's final episodes.)

Why have financial question marks appeared so regularly next to his name? "Because that's the first arrow enemies reach for. I could raise a complaint against you about your expenses. It would be wholly false but it would be on your record and if I were a malign individual, wholly opposed to you, that's what I might do." By the time Galloway repeats this thought later in the interview, it's beginning to have an edge. Perhaps because he says: "I could raise," instead of the more neutral, "if someone raised". He always opts for the personal, the vehement, which is partly why he's such an impressive speaker. It's also why he has amassed enemies.

"I think I have been unnecessarily personal in my political exchanges," he admits. "I think, I hope, I can avoid that a little in the future. Sometimes when you are writing a column in a tabloid newspaper, the temptation to throw in a zinger is quite strong."

Does legal victory remove question marks for voters? Well, he says, take his Canadian ban last year. The Canadian government claimed he was a terrorist because of his Palestinian links. "It was a completely ridiculous allegation but it's out there. I took it to court. I won. What more can you do? Are there people in Canada who still think I'm a terrorist? Yes." Maybe he enjoys the scrap? "There's no way I enjoy the scrap or am glad a significant number of people dislike me … only a mad man would like that."

Why does he think some people still say: "I don't trust that man?" "I think you are barking up the wrong tree on that line if you don't mind me saying so. It's not a question of, 'I don't trust that man'. It's, 'I hate that man because of what he does and says.'"

Well, let's look more closely at why trust might be an issue. He is a socialist with a reputation for high living and sometimes people get uneasy with that combination. Champagne socialism, they say – though, of course, Galloway has never tasted champagne. He did, though, have a penchant for fancy cigars and designer clothes. And how many houses does he own? "I own one house in London which I had to buy as part of my divorce settlement." (He doesn't live there because he lives with his new partner.) What about his house in Portugal? He hesitates only momentarily. "My daughter has that house now."

Galloway is quite open about money. "If you are asking me do I earn a very large sum of money. I certainly do." From broadcasting? (He hosts a radio show on talkSPORT and a TV show on Tehran-based Press TV.) "I'll tell you, though I have no obligation to do so. I earn well over a quarter of a million a year from radio and TV. I earn another £50,000 from my writing. Then people pay very substantial sums of money to hear me speak." (He is currently on a major Canadian speaking tour, with thousands expected at venues, partly because of his earlier ban.) "My earnings will be getting up to half a million pounds a year.

"So what do I spend it on? Let's look at the more noble things first. I spend it on employing people. I have the same number of staff I had when an MP (3.5). What I've lost is the £105,000." Why does he need staff? "Because I'm still busy in politics and I don't want to sack anybody." Plus, he speaks for free on Palestinian issues. "Thirdly, I have a lot of ex wives and that's expensive. But I swear to you, by all that is holy, that I have nothing in the bank." What is this? It only counts if you don't spend it? He prefers to have nothing? "No, I worry about it a wee bit." Could he change it? Not really. The ex wives are there unless they remarry and he needs the staff. "The only solution is to earn more."

Perhaps the issue with wealth … but Galloway interrupts … "Is there an issue with wealth, Catherine?" Oh, that dangerously quiet tone. The strangely smooth use of name. Now, Galloway has certainly been a powerful advocate for the poor and oppressed in his career. And being wealthy doesn't mean you can't be a socialist. But perhaps you run into presentational difficulties if you are a socialist politician, representing ordinary people and arguing for a fairer distribution of wealth, when you earn half a million pounds a year but say you need more.

He knows more about socialism than I do, he says. He can think of no tenet that is against people earning large sums of money. "If we had a socialist system, I would favour the idea advanced by Aristotle, that no one person should be more than three times wealthier than the poorest, but we don't have a socialist society." Aristotle. That's going back a bit. So if we had socialism, he'd give up his money? "Of course." He already argues for higher taxes. What about giving some up while he's waiting? He wouldn't let his employers away with it. He doesn't agree with socialist MSPs, like Tommy Sheridan, taking only the average worker's wage? "No, I don't. I think it's tokenistic. So if anyone is thinking I will work for a worker's wage in the Scottish parliament, I won't."

There is a fearlessness about George Galloway that you can't help admiring. The only thing he's frightened of, he says, is God's judgment. He has to die first – doesn't he fear that? "No," he replies instantly. "I am ready to die right now." He got a death threat from Canada recently. "I have to be ready."

I'd guess one of his weaknesses on the judgment scales might be women. Fair? "I'd rather put it in a positive way. I like women. I prefer their company to men's. I don't drink, don't cuss. I'm not crude. I can think of nothing worse than stag affairs." He's "very happy" now in his personal life. He has a grown-up daughter and three grandchildren from his first marriage to Elaine Fyffe. His second marriage to Amineh Abu-Zayyad ended in divorce but he now has a three-year-old son with his current partner Rima Husseini and wants more children. There have been many stories about affairs over the years but he points out that he and Elaine were separated for 13 years before they divorced and stories about his 'adulterous' relationships were misleading.

Didn't Zayyad accuse him of many "friendships" with women? "That's true but she meant relationships, not sexual …" He stops. "If you are directly asking me if I have ever committed adultery, then I have. If you are asking me if I am a sinner, yes I am." Should voters draw any conclusions about his integrity from that? "My life is an open book, all too open. People can consult it and make conclusions if they like. It's really a matter for them."

That wasn't the question. People can draw conclusions – but should they? Is it legitimate to say: "George Galloway cheated on his wives, he'll cheat on me as a voter?" "I'm not saying I cheated on my wives. But he said he committed adultery – presumably in his last marriage? "Actually I didn't – that wasn't the marriage I was referring to. The person on whom I cheated was my first wife and she didn't deserve it. I have flaws – but not the flaws people think."

The Labour Party certainly capitalised on the Tories' "back to basics" faux pas but Galloway says that was about hypocrisy. "That's the worst sin, far worse than adultery."

If he returned to the Scottish parliament, he would divide his time between London and Scotland. Not sure how that would go down in Glasgow but Galloway argues it's all one nation. He's very pro union. "With what's happening in the world economy, the case for getting out of a moderately ocean-going liner and into a Para Handy-style puffer steamer should be obvious …" Though, to be honest, it's personal, not world finances, we return to. "The way things are going, I won't be leaving my children any more than my father left me," he says. It's hard to make ends meet on half a million a year

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Quite a lengthy effort - I'd imagine that's because Catherine Deveney was desperate to eke out whatever she could from it, garnering little more from her mining expedition than a few flinty sparks. As soon as she mentioned Big Brother she'd played her 'ace' though... tsk tsk, what an amateur. She should stick to interviewing people she has a chance of nailing anything to, or even understanding. I hear The Chuckle Brothers are in town soon...