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| Tory grandee Lord McAlpine dies at home in Italy | |
| (34 minutes later) | |
| Lord McAlpine, the former UK Conservative Party deputy chairman has died, his family has announced. | Lord McAlpine, the former UK Conservative Party deputy chairman has died, his family has announced. |
| The 71-year-old, who was an aide to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, died last night in Italy, his family said. | The 71-year-old, who was an aide to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, died last night in Italy, his family said. |
| Prime Minister David Cameron tweeted his thoughts were with his family, adding he was a "dedicated supporter of Margaret Thatcher and the Tory party". | |
| As well as a politician, the peer was an art collector, property developer, author and fundraiser. | |
| He was also part of the McAlpine construction dynasty. | |
| Founded by his grandfather, Sir Robert, the firm is one of the biggest builders in the UK, responsible for the London 2012 Olympic stadium among many other projects. | |
| He was made a director of the family firm at 21, five years after dropping out of top public school Stowe with three O-levels. | |
| Lord McAlpine then went on to make a fortune of his own as a property developer in Australia, before turning to politics in 1975, when he met Lady Thatcher. | |
| He became one of her closest advisers and Conservative Party treasurer throughout her period in office, from 1979 to 1990. | |
| She made him a life peer, Baron McAlpine of West Green in Hampshire, in 1984. | |
| In recent years, Lord McAlpine was wrongly implicated in a child abuse scandal, when the allegations were the subject of a BBC Newsnight investigation. | |
| The allegations forced the BBC's then director-general, George Entwistle, to quit less than two months into the role. |