I’m sorry to announce that Andrea Warner passed away today at 2.20 pm. For those who didn’t know her, Andrea had been battling cancer since she attended as the lead LI delegate to Annual conference in 2017.  She was diagnosed with terminal cancer shortly afterwards. Despite being very ill, she continued to post on FB groups up until just a couple of weeks ago. She was a founder member of the Canaries and Southern Spain branch and was the chair and then treasurer until she fell too ill.

Andrea was a lifelong Socialist and a Jeremy Corbyn supporter. Shortly after she fell ill, LI members asked Jeremy to send her a personal letter thanking her for her dedication to socialism, which he did. She was thrilled and had it framed. She contributed to the LI women book “We are Women, Hear Us Roar”. We managed to get a copy of the book to her in the UK.

Andrea was a teacher of children with special needs including behaviour difficulties, deafness and Educational Special Needs  but specialised in dyslexia.  She got kids who could not read at the age of 13 into University.  During the miners strike she invited miners to stay with her.  She supported, visited and protested at Greenham Common and had been on many marches.  She belonged to The Cuba Support Group.  She did all of this whilst working full time teaching dyslexic children (and adults in her own time) and being a single parent working about 5 jobs at a time to provide a roof over her children’s heads.

Andrea remained positive and committed right to the end. She outlived all the predictions of medical staff except the final battle. She wanted to stay alive to see a Labour government,  and we think that it was this that kept her going right up to the end, despite the pain she was in.

She will be remembered not just by her family and friends, but by her comrades too.

Jenny Semahimbo, co-chair, for the LICC, 2 February 2019