A Labour spokesperson said: “It is with great sadness that we announce that Joe Haines, who served as press secretary to Harold Wilson, died today at his home in Tunbridge Wells, Kent.
Joe Haines, the former press secretary to Harold Wilson, has died aged 97, the Labour party has said.
Haines served as press secretary to the Labour prime minister for two periods in the late 1960s and mid-70s, after working as a political journalist for the Sun before it was owned by Rupert Murdoch.
“Joe, who was 97, had two spells as press secretary to the former Labour prime minister in the late 1960s and mid-1970s, becoming one of his most trusted advisers.”.
Revealing the secret he had kept for half a century, Haines said in an interview with the Times that he was told of the “love match” by Wilson and Hewlett-Davies, who was 22 years Wilson’s junior.
