His mother, Bluma 'Bloomah' (died 1961 in Hampshire) came from a town called Yampil, Khmelnytskyi Oblast in the Volyn region, of the Western Ukraine.
His brother (Neville) Norman Mikardo (1924–2004), a mechanical engineer, was a Labour Party councillor for Tokyngton Ward of Brent South, from 1978–82.
[1][5][11] Concerned by injustice and inequality from boyhood, Mikardo was influenced by the works of R. H. Tawney and George Bernard Shaw in his teens.
They married at Mile End and Bow District synagogue on 3 January 1932,[12] and Mary joined the Labour Party and Poale Zion.
He became a freelance management consultant and during the Second World War, worked on increasing efficiency in aircraft and armaments manufacturing, principally at Woodley Aerodrome[13] in Reading.
After settling in Reading at the end of the war he was selected by the local Constituency Labour Party for the 1945 general election, beating James Callaghan and Austen Albu.
He held Reading, which became a highly marginal seat, until the 1959 general election when he was ousted by Peter Emery of the Association of Supervisory Staffs, Executives and Technicians, later the Association of Scientific, Technical and Managerial Staffs and Manufacturing Science and Finance trade union.
Ian Mikardo Way, a road in Lower Caversham, Reading, commemorates his role as the town's MP.
[15] Mikardo's secretary at the time was Jo Richardson (1923–94) who began her political career working for him and later became a Member of Parliament herself.
In 1951 Richardson was elected to Hornsey Borough Council and became the full-time secretary and working partner of Mikardo in his business, which involved trade with eastern Europe.
[17] Mikardo was defeated in his Reading seat in 1959 but won Poplar in the General Election of 1964, representing the area of London where his parents had first settled.
A necessarily anonymous and discerning experienced clerk of the House of Commons remarked 'Ian Mikardo was simply the most skillful operator in committee that any of us ever saw.
[19] In early 1947 a small number of the 'King's Speech dissenters' in the Labour Party formed the 'Keep Left' group and met on a regular basis during that year.
Along with Richard Crossman, Michael Foot and Konni Zilliacus,[20] Mikardo published a pamphlet of the same name in May 1947 in which the authors criticized the United States cold war policies and urged a closer relationship with Europe in order to create a "Third Force" in politics.
[22] During the period of office of Clement Attlee's Labour government, the Keep Left group attempted, through discussion and pamphlets, to produce practical proposals informed by socialist values.
The vision of a more rational and ethical society discussed by a group of talented young politicians two decades earlier was at odds with sentiments deeply rooted in their party.
It recommended total restructuring of the docks under public ownership and with a system of decentralisation and workers' participation in management wider than for any other industry.
[10] Had the committee's proposals been put into practice, the seamen's strike and its crippling effect on the economy might have been avoided.
He also stated that a civil servant had advised Ministers to deceive the Select Committee by withholding information.
Mikardo quoted one of the reasons given for withholding, namely that the rules of engagement would have to be paraphrased considerably or they would be almost incomprehensible to the layman.
[26] Mikardo stated that a number of people had said that they could not understand why the Government had prosecuted Clive Ponting (who had been acquitted).
"[26] John Browne (MP for Winchester) asked: "What greater test can any Government face than to fight a military campaign and have a disloyal adviser in a key area of defence?
He worked with Mapam, the Israeli United Workers' Party, and abhorred gratuitous provocation of the Palestinian Arabs.
[1] Instances include: Mikardo died, age 84, on 6 May 1993 from a stroke, whilst being treated for sarcoma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease at Stepping Hill Hospital, Stockport, Cheshire.