Commiserations! How Cliff Richard, 82, ‘never got over Spanish dictator Franco’s plot to fix Eurovision result’
- Phil Coulter, who co-wrote Richard’s 1968 entry hit, said singer was ‘still stung’
- Fascist General Franco was accused of bribing Eurovision to vote for Spain
Cliff Richard has still not come to terms with the fact he was ‘robbed’ of victory at the 1968 Eurovision Song Contest – possibly because of a plot by Spanish security services.
The writer of Sir Cliff’s entry Congratulations today reveals the singer was still ‘stung’ by the fact he was pipped at the post by Spanish singer Massiel and her song La, la, la which won by just one point.
The star’s sense of disappointment has been exacerbated by repeated claims the competition, which took place at London’s Royal Albert Hall, was fixed by Spain’s Fascist dictator General Franco who bribed Eurovision juries to vote for his country’s entry.
Phil Coulter, who co-wrote the track with Bill Martin, told The Reunion on BBC Radio 4: ‘It stung Cliff, he’s never gotten over the fact he didn’t win.’
The pair also co-wrote Sandi Shaw’s 1967 Eurovision winner Puppet On A String and had hoped they would become the first songwriters to win two years running.
Cliff Richard has still not come to terms with the fact he was ‘robbed’ of victory at the 1968 Eurovision Song Contest – possibly because of a plot by Spanish security services
But their hopes were unexpectedly dashed at the last minute. Coulter said: ‘It hurt at the time, especially when there were rumours of dark deeds by General Franco to bribe juries.
‘In the Royal Albert Hall, with two countries to vote, the floor manager came down and took us out of our seats because we were six or seven points ahead… I still wake up with nightmares about that. We were side stage and going to enter the history books. But then Germany gave seven points to Spain and none to the UK which felt strange because Congratulations had been scoring readily and steadily all night.’
He added: ‘Something felt seriously not right to Bill and I because we got drunk immediately afterwards. I can tell you that.’
Not everyone is convinced Franco tried to fix the contest. Dean Vuletic, a Eurovision expert, believes Franco may have tried to fix a rival Eastern Bloc contest called Intervision rather than Eurovision itself.
The UK managed to regain some sense of national pride in 1969 when Lulu came joint first with Boom Bang-a-Bang. Sir Cliff represented the UK again in 1973 with Power To All Our Friends and on that occasion had to settle for third place.
The Reunion is on BBC Radio 4 today at 11.15am.
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