Former Labour deputy prime minister John Prescott has died aged 86 following a battle with Alzheimer's, his family has announced. Sir Tony Blair says he is 'devastated' by the news, hailing the politician's 'extraordinary accomplishments'.
John Leslie Prescott was born on 31 May 1938 in Prestatyn, Wales, to his parents John and Phyllis.He came from working-class roots, with his father working on the railways and his grandfather a miner.In his autobiography, Pulling No Punches, he described his father as an 'old-fashioned socialist' who 'believed in fairness and equality', but that he also had a 'meanness' and made his mother 'very unhappy' at times.
A year after his birth and with his mother pregnant with his brother Ray, his father was called up to fight in the war and in 1940, after being shot in the knee, he had to have his leg amputated.By the age of four and now with a sister, Dawn, he had moved to Yorkshire for his father to take up a post as a controller back on the railways, just in time to pick up his trademark accent.
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