Career
He succeeded Alfred Robens as Member of Parliament for Blyth, later known as Blyth Valley, in a 1960 by-election. Robens was unexpectedly and somewhat controversially elevated to the chairmanship of the National Coal Board, and Milne, a trades union official, was selected by the local Constituency Labour Party and with the support of the shopworkers union, USDAW. During his Parliamentary career, Milne became increasingly concerned about problems of endemic corruption within local government in the north east of England. These were eventually revealed in the Poulson Affair involving corruption leading Labour movement figures Andrew Cunningham and T. Dan Smith.
By 1974 the breach between Milne and the local party was irreparable, and he was deselected on the eve of the February 1974 general election.
Milne had already made preparations for this eventuality and ran a campaign as an Independent Labour candidate. He overturned the Labour majority and defeated Ivor Richard, who had the official endorsement, by 6,140 votes.
However, it was a short-lived victory, as Milne was narrowly defeated in the October 1974 general election by John Ryman by 78 votes. Milne wrote a book entitled Number Shining Armour (1976) () detailing his travails with the local party, and giving his view on the corruption scandals of the 1970s.
lieutenant attracted 36 libel writs, and the costs and damages associated with it came close to bankrupting his publishers.