A REBEL with a cause for more than 40 years, Sir Teddy Taylor has suddenly found himself on the winning side at the age of 79.

The former Rochford and Southend East MP, who famously resigned from Sir Edward Heath’s government in 1971 over plans to take Britain into Europe and was called a “b*****d” by John Major 20 years later, has mellowed in retirement from his days as a right-wing firebrand.

However, according to East of England Vote Leave co-ordinator and Southend councillor James Moyies, Sir Teddy delivered more leaflets than anyone else in Southend during the campaign – and he has not shied away from making his voice heard on the aftermath of the referendum.

“I’m very happy with the result,” he chimes in his polished Glasgow accent, “but I get the impression everyone’s getting a bit worried about what the implications will be and I wish people would think about what’s actually happened.

“What I found really impressive about the referendum was the amount of people who turned up and wanted to vote for something so important, and I think there are three things which will come out of this to make people’s lives better.

“Firstly, our democracy has been restored. Before I stepped down from Parliament 11 years ago, I found we were kept up until two to three in the morning a lot of the time because there were so many bills we had to pass which were coming from Europe – and they’re about 60 per cent of all bills passed now.

“Secondly, there’s going to be a big change in the financial arrangements of this country. There will be a huge reduction in the money we have to send to Europe – whether it was £324m or £240m. Thirdly, if the Government published what our trade actually is with Europe and the rest of the world, I think people would be a lot less worried.

“One of the things which annoyed me about the campaign was people weren’t telling the truth – but every year I was in Parliament, except 1980, we found our trade with Europe was getting worse and our trade with the rest of the world was getting better. This is one of the things Ted Heath and I disagreed with.”

At the time Sir Teddy was a young Under-secretary of State for Scotland in Sir Edward’s government, which had won a surprise victory in an election only a year previously.

But his leader’s determination to take Britain into what was then the European Economic Community put the two at loggerheads.

“The Government started discussions shortly after I became a minister,” he says, “and when I found out it was taking place it worried me a great deal. Ted Heath and I had discussions about it and in fairness to Ted, although I was the only person who resigned from his government and caused him slight embarrassment, he couldn’t have been nicer about it.

“He invited me in for several cups of tea and said ‘I think you’re making a great mistake, Teddy, you’ve a great political career ahead of you and are the youngest member of my Government, I think you could go a long way.’

“I replied by saying he was making a great mistake because he should be remembered as a great Prime Minister but would instead be remembered as the man who took us into the Common Market. But, although we had great disagreements, the interesting thing was we were actually very good friends and he spoke for me in the election afterwards in February 1974. We had respect for each other.”

There was much less love lost between Sir Teddy and one of Sir Edward’s successors, Sir John Major, in 1993 when the embattled Tory prime minister was facing a rebellion over the Maastricht Treaty, which turned the EEC into the modern-day European Union.

Seen as a trouble maker, Sir Teddy was one of eight MPs who were effectively kicked out of the Parliamentary party and described as “b******s” by the PM.

“It was pretty rough stuff,” Sir Teddy recalls. “He wrote to our constituency associations saying they should select someone else as their MP because they had someone who was not supporting the party. But I was very lucky because Southend stood by me.

“The Prime Minister was very mad because he saw us as troublemakers, but we felt it was important and wanted to go ahead. There are only four of us left but we still keep in touch and have dinner now and then. They’re very decent people and I love them.”

The only Tory prime minister Sir Teddy did not appear to have any run-ins with was Margaret Thatcher, who he served under in her 1975-79 shadow cabinet, and who he recalls had a “road to Damascus” conversion over Europe.

“She was someone who changed her views and we were very good friends,” Sir Teddy says. “She was originally a euro-enthusiast but then became very much a Eurosceptic. She was one of the nicest people I ever met and the great thing about her was she told the truth.

“I think she would have been very happy indeed with this result.”