House of Commons in November 1984 against the Government's reduction in benefits to the wives of strikers; the Speaker was forced to adjourn the sitting. International affairs Throughout his time in Parliament, McTaggart showed an interest in visiting foreign countries. He was a guest of the North Korean government in visiting the country in September 1980, and of the Palestine Liberation Organization in visiting Jordan, the West Bank and Lebanon in January and February 1981. He urged recognition of the PLO as the "legitimate representative" of Palestinian people and pledged support for Palestinian "inalienable rights" in April 1983. After visiting Libya in 1983, he was due to go to the Libyan People's Bureau in London on the day that WPC Yvonne Fletcher was shot in April 1984; his offer to help negotiate with the Libyans was declined by the police at the ensuing siege. He was part of a Labour Action for Peace delegation to Moscow earlier in 1984. Domestic issues Glasgow Central included the historic centre of the city and McTaggart lived in a council house near the city centre; it expanded south of the River Clyde in 1983 to include Hutchesontown, where there were many tower blocks in poor condition. McTaggart backed a bid from the New Gorbals Trust charity to buy and demolish the Hutchesontown E block in 1985. He criticised the Scottish Office minister Michael Ancram for calling on local authorities to remove asbestos from buildings but refusing to give them the money to do so. He was re-elected with a 17,253 majority in the 1987 general election, having achieved an 8.7% swing to Labour. McTaggart was chairman of the all-party Scottish Penal Affairs Committee, where he worked quietly for improvements in prison conditions. After a series of prison disturbances, including one at Perth jail where a prison officer was taken hostage for 17 hours, he pointed to poor morale among prison officers and urged improvements in the parole system which he claimed were at the root of the problem. He raised cases of alleged mistreatment of prisoners, and called for model prisoners to be released early. Sudden death In the deputy leadership election of 1988, McTaggart endorsed John Prescott rather than the further left Socialist Campaign Group candidate Eric Heffer. Owing to rule changes in the Labour Party requiring that a woman be shortlisted for every Parliamentary selection, he expected to be challenged for reselection