DENNIS IAN WRIGLEY and why I became a Liberal.

I was 14 in 1966, living in New Mills. For those who don't know it, it is at the top left corner of High Peak.

Quite a bright spark for a girl from such a working-class family, daughter of a builder's labourer and part-time factory worker, who always voted Labour. I'd got a scholarship to a "posh" girls' school, but never quite learned how to be "posh". I went to the local Youth Club, that so-called "den of iniquity" that reputedly attracted yobbos and louts (mostly male, by definition). I never believed those labels. I never met any yobbos or louts there, just ordinary teenagers. Yeah, lots from the council estate. So what? I'd spent 10 years with mates from the council estate. Most of my relatives lived on council estates. Great places to be back then.

A trainee youth leader came to the Club on placement from his degree in Youth Studies at Sheffield University, aged just 20. We all took to him like a shot. He was "nearly" our age, and we looked up to him.

So just before the General Election of 1966, the trainee youth leader thought we all needed a bit of insight into politics, and he invited the three candidates in High Peak to speak to us at the Youth Club. They were David Walder (Conservative), Peter Jackson (Labour) and Dennis Wrigley (Liberal). Of course, none of us were yet eligible to vote, and wouldn't be for another four years. But the trainee thought we were of an age to be introduced to politics. And anyway, he would be back at Uni in a few months, so this was his only chance to tick some boxes on his placement form. Cynical.

The candidates came on different nights, except I don't think David Walder came at all. No matter, some teenagers were firm Tories cos their parents were farmers, or doctors and lawyers. And none of the other kids would ever vote anything but Labour. There were certainly no Liberal kids there. So it was all a waste of time, wasn't it?

Peter Jackson came first. Fairly young bloke, with a beard and sandals, a tad scruffy. Kids took to him at once cos he was just like them. Except he didn't really engage with us. He talked above us and at us, like we were 14-year-olds who knew nothing. We were, in fact, 14-year-olds who knew nothing. And whilst he was okay, he left us feeling like we were, well, 14-year-olds who knew nothing.

A week later Dennis Wrigley came. Smartly dressed, middle-aged, no beard or sandals. Crikey, he was going to be boring for sure. How wrong we were. He treated us like we really mattered, our views were really important to him. He didn't TELL us stuff about the Liberal Party (unless we asked) he ASKED us stuff about our own opinions and told us where the Liberals were on those topics. And you could tell that it all went in. We MATTERED to him, to his Party, to his life even.

After the visits I engineered a group discussion about the visits. That's the sort of thing I did at 14. About twenty 14-year-olds joined in, and of those twenty, twenty declared they liked Dennis Wrigley the best. Of course, you would, wouldn't you, if a middle-aged man listened to you? As it happens, Dennis was only 36, but middle-aged to us. And those twenty included the sons and daughters of farmers, doctors and lawyers who always voted Tory.

Four years on and we had the vote for the first time.

The political parties held a hustings meeting in St George's Parish Hall. By now the Tory candidate was Spencer Le Marchant. Spencer, eh? Posh name, that. Peter Jackson for Labour, and Dennis Wrigley for the Liberals.

Twelve of those 14-year-olds from 1966 attended the hustings.

The candidates all got some stick from the crowded room of about 120 people as they fielded questions from the audience. Spencer had to refer to his "assistant" for the answers to most questions; Peter gave stock "Labour Manifesto" answers (with a copy in his hands to refer to) and Dennis Wrigley spoke with no props, and from the heart, and with passion and belief in what he was saying. He LISTENED to the questioners and answered them with his own words.

ALL 12 OF US EX-YOUTH-CLUB MEMBERS DECIDED TO VOTE FOR DENNIS WRIGLEY, on the basis that he was the most honest of all three candidates. And we liked the policies of the Liberal Party too (not that we were 100% sure what they were, but we were pretty sure that such a good bloke would be in a party with decent policies).

The point is that Dennis was indeed charismatic, but not because of any particular flair that he had, but because he BELIEVED 200% IN WHAT HE WAS SAYING and it was obvious that he did. It was both refreshing and stimulating to us 18-year olds. And unsurprisingly, nearly 50 years on, I find that most of those teenagers from 1966 still vote Lib-Dem, and all because of the influence of Dennis Wrigley, who treated them as people at the age of 14.

Sadly, the election of 1970 did not see our opinions mirrored by other voters and our share of the poll dropped to 16%, its lowest in High Peak's history at that point - a disappointment when Dennis had managed 31% in 1961.

But I have no doubt that Dennis Wrigley enthused the teenagers at New Mills Youth Club back in 1966 and I will always be glad that he was the man that he was back then, and clearly was till last week, as a minister in the church that he founded.

He will be sadly missed, not only by his family and those who knew him in recent years, but by those of us who were impressed by him 50 years ago.

He changed lives and views. Tory kids voted Liberal, Socialist kids voted Liberal.

And after I told my dad how good Dennis had been my dad voted Liberal too.

All because of one honest, decent, genuine man.

RIP Dennis.