[1] He was educated at Westminster School[2] and Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, where he read Natural Sciences, graduating in 1938.

[1] When Heath became prime minister in 1970, he served as Secretary of State for Employment and was responsible for the modernising Industrial Relations Act 1971, which balanced the introduction of compensation for unfair dismissal with curbs on the freedom to strike and the virtual abolition of closed shop agreements.

[5] In 1972, Carr served a brief period as Lord President of the Council and then was appointed Home Secretary following Reginald Maudling's resignation.

[6] The day after her election the new leader, Margaret Thatcher met with Carr, according to her at his request, before she formed shadow cabinet.

She told him that she could not promise that and confided in her memoirs that at that stage, she was still considering appointments and was "not convinced" that she would offer Carr any role in the shadow cabinet.

In her memoirs, she speculated that Carr might have been "persuaded to stay in another capacity" but did not offer him the chance and noted, "I was not keen to have another strong opponent in any position on the team".