a 'Bolshie'. While waiting for the bells to go down at Southwark Fire Station, he read Marxist literature and the Daily Worker and when off duty attended Communist Party meetings. His wife Pat, who he married in 1936, was also a communist sympathiser, heavily involved in supporting Republican Spain during the Civil War. By his own admission, Horner was a crypto-communist during the Second World War, attending both Labour Party conferences and meetings of Communist Party members in the FBU. Many of the FBU's officials were communists, including Bob Darke whose book, The Communist Technique (Penguin 1952) made detailed allegations about Horner and the influence of the Communist Party on the FBU. In 1945 Horner turned down offers for him to stand as a Labour candidate in that year's General Election and instead formally joined the British Communist Party, a decision he was later to regret He was a valued asset to the Communist Party and served on its executive committee. During the post-war decade there were few unions so strongly communist in its leadership as the FBU that followed the Party line on Cold War issues such as the Korean War and German rearmament, resulting in the TUC leadership blocking Horner's election to the TUC General Council. In 1956, Horner and his wife Pat resigned from the Communist Party around the time of the Soviet invasion of Hungary. Horner joined the Labour Party and threw himself into supporting the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, founded in 1958. At the 1960 Labour Party Conference, he seconded Frank Cousins in moving the successful resolution for unilateral nuclear disarmament. After his election to Parliament in 1964 he became an effective and hardworking back-bencher, serving on the Select Committee on Nationalised Industries. Fellow MP, Tam Dalyell was to wrote that Horner was denied the ministerial office that many of his contemporaries thought he deserved because Harold Wilson, the Prime Minister, was too nervous about appointing such a prominent ex-communist. In 1970, Horner lost his seat in the General Election and retired to live with Pat in Ross-on-Wye. His book, Studies in Industrial Democracy (Gollancz) was published in 1974. Horner was known as a great raconteur and a polymath, fascinated by art, literature and philosophy with a deep interest in history and 'an impeccable guide to the castles, churches and village inns of the Welsh borders'. References 1911 births 1997 deaths London Fire Brigade personnel