Gordon McLennan was General Secretary of the Communist Party of Great Britain

Communist Party of Great Britain

The Communist Party of Great Britain was the largest communist party in Great Britain, although it never became a mass party like those in France and Italy. It existed from 1920 to 1991.-Formation:...

 (CPGB) between 1975 and 1990.

Born in Glasgow

Glasgow

Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...

, McLennan worked as an engineering draughtsperson

Technical drawing

Technical drawing, also known as drafting or draughting, is the act and discipline of composing plans that visually communicate how something functions or has to be constructed.Drafting is the language of industry....

 before taking on various full-time posts within the CPGB. He contested the Glasgow Govan constituency

Glasgow Govan (UK Parliament constituency)

Glasgow Govan was a parliamentary constituency in the Govan district of Glasgow. It was represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom from 1885 until 2005, returning one Member of Parliament elected by the first-past-the-post system.The area which the constituency...

 in the 1959 UK general election, then the West Lothian by-election, 1962

West Lothian by-election, 1962

The West Lothian by-election, 1962 was a British parliamentary by-election held in the West Lothian constituency in Scotland on 14 June 1962, caused by the death of John Taylor...

; Govan in the 1964 and 1966 UK general elections. He became the National Organiser of the CPGB in 1966, and while holding this post, contested elections in St Pancras North in the 1970 and February 1974 general elections.

In 1975, McLennan was elected General Secretary of the CPGB. He held the post while the party was in terminal decline, with factional fighting within the CPGB, finally stepping down in 1989. After the dissolution of the party, in 1991, he joined the Communist Party of Scotland

Communist Party of Scotland

The Communist Party of Scotland , also known as Pàrtaidh Co-Mhaoineach na h-Alba, was established in 1991 when the Communist Party of Great Britain was disbanded and re-formed as the Democratic Left think-tank. Many Communists in Scotland disagreed with this decision and instead set up the CPS,...

. He remained active in the pensioners' movement and supported the Respect – The Unity Coalition candidate George Galloway

George Galloway

George Galloway is a British politician, author, journalist and broadcaster who was a Member of Parliament from 1987 to 2010. He was formerly an MP for the Labour Party, first for Glasgow Hillhead and later for Glasgow Kelvin, before his expulsion from the party in October 2003, the same year...

 in the 2005 general election. He also maintained contact with the Alliance for Green Socialism

Alliance for Green Socialism

The Alliance for Green Socialism is a socialist and environmentalist political grouping operating across Britain...

, one of the successor bodies to the CPGB (via the Green Socialist Network

Green Socialist Network

The Green Socialist Network was a socialist environmentalist political grouping whose origins go back to the Communist Party of Great Britain ....

) but although he addressed AGS meetings and wrote for the AGS journal (Green Socialist) he never joined this organisation.