Gordon Brown tells of day he invited notorious burglar into his parents' home
By Kirsty Walker and Nicholas Cecil
Last updated at 6:22 PM on 30th December 2008
A young Gordon Brown in 1960. He has told how he invited a notorious burglar into his home as a child
Gordon Brown has revealed how he unknowingly invited a notorious burglar into his family home when he was a ten-year-old boy.
The Prime Minister said that his father John Brown, a Church of Scotland minister, had encouraged him to open the family manse to all those in need.
In a BBC Radio 4 Today programme interview, he said: "People used to come to our house … and ask for money, ask for help, ask for all sorts of different things.
"Every day something different was happening and you came to a very clear view that you had responsibilities in the community and you had to do the best you can to help people.
"In fact one day I was taking up my father's advice and my parents were out, and someone came to the door, and I just offered them 'come in and have some food'.
"It ended up with my parents coming back and discovering that the most notorious burglar in the town had actually been invited in by me to come and have some food."
Mr Brown reflected: "He didn't, fortunately, steal anything."
The Prime Minister’s childhood encounter with a burglar has echoes of Oliver Letwin’s decision to allow a man into his Kennington home at 5am because he wanted to go to the lavatory.
The incident, which took place when Mr Letwin was shadow home secretary, saw him chasing two men down the street in his pyjamas after they stole his wallet.
Mr Brown also spoke about his vow to oppose any new law to legalise assisted suicide. 'It is not really for us to create any legislation that would put pressure on people to feel that they had to offer themselves because they were causing trouble to a relative or anything else,' he said.
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