Labour leader Ed Miliband paid tribute yesterday to the thousands of anti-apartheid campaigners and ANC activists who helped Nelson Mandela's vision become a reality.

Addressing a hushed Commons chamber, Mr Miliband said Mr Mandela had demonstrated the power of people and politics to change the world.

The Labour leader spoke as MPs abandoned planned Commons business for an emotion-charged session of tributes to the great South African.

Mr Miliband declared: "We should also remember today the hundreds of thousands of people who were the anti-apartheid movement in Britain.

"People who stood month after month, year after year on the steps of the embassy when the cause seemed utterly futile."

The Labour leader recalled the church people, trade unionists and campaigners who had marched and protested.

He also spoke of Nelson Mandela's fellow leaders of the ANC whose names would be "etched in history."

Mr Miliband named Communist Party members Ruth First and Joe Slovo as among these heroic South Africans who had for a time found sanctuary in Britain.

Ruth and Joe's daughter Gillian was in the Commons public gallery to hear this moving tribute to her parents.

Former Labour minister and leading anti-apartheid activist Peter Hain MP did not shrink from describing the Conservative Party's record as "craven indulgence toward the apartheid rulers."

Mr Hain said everyone should strive on one of their best days to be like Mr Mandela.

But he added: "There were many many tens of thousands of activists in the anti-apartheid movement who deserve to be acknowledged as well."

Prime Minister David Cameron said Mr Mandela was "a towering figure in our lifetime."

Skating over his own party's record, Mr Cameron even praised Mr Hain for his campaigning and declared that "there were millions across our country who said no to apartheid."

Mr Cameron and Labour leader Ed Miliband were flying out last night to attend today's memorial service for Mr Mandela in a Johannesburg stadium.

Mr Miliband was accompanied by his wife Justine.

Also attending the ceremony will be Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and former prime ministers Gordon Brown, Tony Blair and Sir John Major.