1.
House of Commons of the United Kingdom
–
The House of Commons of the United Kingdom is the lower house of the countrys parliament. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster, officially, the full name of the house is, The Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. The House is a body consisting of 650 members known as Members of Parliament. Members are elected to represent constituencies by first-past-the-post and hold their seats until Parliament is dissolved, under the Parliament Act 1911, the Lords power to reject legislation was reduced to a delaying power. The Government is primarily responsible to the House of Commons and the prime minister stays in office only as long as he or she retains the support of a majority of its members. Although it does not formally elect the prime minister, the position of the parties in the House of Commons is of overriding importance, by convention, the prime minister is answerable to, and must maintain the support of, the House of Commons. Since 1963, by convention, the minister is always a member of the House of Commons. The Commons may indicate its lack of support for the Government by rejecting a motion of confidence or by passing a motion of no confidence, confidence and no confidence motions are sometimes phrased explicitly, for instance, That this House has no confidence in Her Majestys Government. Many other motions were considered confidence issues, even though not explicitly phrased as such, in particular, important bills that form a part of the Governments agenda were formerly considered matters of confidence, as is the annual Budget. Parliament normally sits for a term of five years. Subject to that limit, the minister could formerly choose the timing of the dissolution of parliament. By this second mechanism, the government of the United Kingdom can change without a general election. In such circumstances there may not even have been a party leadership election, as the new leader may be chosen by acclaim. A prime minister may resign if he or she is not defeated at the polls. In such a case, the premiership goes to whoever can command a majority in the House of Commons, in practice this is usually the new leader of the outgoing prime ministers party. Until 1965, the Conservative Party had no mechanism for electing a new leader, when Anthony Eden resigned as PM in 1957 without recommending a successor and it fell to the Queen to appoint Harold Macmillan as the new prime minister, after taking the advice of ministers. By convention, all ministers must be members of the House of Commons or of the House of Lords, a handful have been appointed who were outside Parliament, but in most cases they then entered Parliament either in a by-election or by receiving a peerage. Since 1902, all ministers have been members of the Commons
2.
Bob Blackman (politician)
–
Robert John Blackman, better known as Bob Blackman, is a Conservative Party politician in the United Kingdom who has been the Member of Parliament for Harrow East since the 2010 general election. He was also a member of the London Assembly, and the Conservative Friends of Israel group, Blackman was Head Boy at Preston Manor High School, where he now serves as a school governor, and was president of University of Liverpool Students Union. He joined the team of Burroughs Machines on graduation. Blackman was a member in the London Borough of Brent from 1986 to 2010. He was the leader of the Conservative group on Brent council from 1990 to 2010 and he stood as a parliamentary candidate for Brent South at the 1992 election, for Bedford at the 1997 election, and for Brent North at the 2005 election. He was elected as the Conservatives Group Whip on the London Assembly, in the 2008 elections, Blackman lost his seat to the Labour candidate, Navin Shah by a 1,649 votes. In 2012, Shah managed to secure the seat by almost 30,000 votes, from June 2006 to May 2010, he was also Deputy Leader of Brent Council, the Conservatives having formed a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. In the 2010 general election, Blackman gained the Harrow East constituency from Labours Tony McNulty, in 2010 he was appointed as a member to the Communities and Local Government Select Committee. He called for the adoption of plain packaging legislation for cigarettes, on 1 July 2015, Blackman was elected Chair of the All Party Political Group on Smoking and Health, of which he had been the secretary for some time. In December 2012, Prime Minister David Cameron announced his approval for same-sex marriage, according to the Harrow Times, he was accused of hypocrisy by a former fellow Brent council colleague who claimed she had an 11-year affair with him whilst he was married. On 5 February 2013 MP Bob Blackman rebelled, voting against the bill in the House of Commons Second Reading vote on marriage equality in Britain, Blackman supported Brexit in the 2016 referendum. He was subsequently ordered to pay back £1,006.20, Blackman is married to former councillor Nicola Blackman, and the couple live in Wembley
3.
Graham Brady
–
Graham Stuart Brady is a British Conservative Party politician and the Member of Parliament for Altrincham and Sale West since 1997. He served as a minister for Europe under four Conservative leaders before resigning in 2007 in protest at David Camerons opposition to grammar schools. He succeeded Sir Michael Spicer as chairman of the 1922 Committee on 26 May 2010, on 1 December 2010, Brady was voted Backbencher of the Year by The Spectator at their annual parliamentary awards. Brady was born on 20 May 1967 in Salford, England and he was educated at the Altrincham Grammar School for Boys, an all-boys grammar school in Altrincham. He studied law at St Aidans College, University of Durham, Brady was appointed a consultant in public relations with Shandwick plc in 1989. He joined the Centre for Policy Studies in 1990 and he was appointed Director of public affairs at the Waterfront Partnership in 1992, where he remained until elected to Westminster in 1997. While at Durham University, he was Chairman of the universitys Conservative Association in 1987 and he was elected Vice Chairman of the Berkshire East Conservative Association in 1992. He was selected to contest the Altrincham and Sale West parliamentary constituency following the retirement of the veteran Conservative MP Fergus Montgomery, bradys constituency is considered to be a Conservative safe seat, having returned a Conservative MP for its entire history. The 1997 general election proved to be a battle. Brady made his speech on 2 June 1997. He became a Member of the Education and Employment Select Committee and he became the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Chairman of the Conservative Party, Michael Ancram in 1999. He was made an Opposition Whip by William Hague in 2000, after the 2001 general election he was the Opposition Spokesman on Education and Skills under both Hague and Iain Duncan Smith. He became the PPS to the Leader of the Opposition, Michael Howard in 2003, on 29 May 2007, Brady resigned his post as Shadow Minister for Europe in protest at Conservative leader David Camerons opposition to Grammar Schools. Bradys own constituency has retained a rather than comprehensive education system. Since 2010 he has been Chairman of the 1922 Committee, in the 2016 EU Referendum he was a supporter of Brexit. The couple married in 1992, and have a daughter and a son, Brady was reported to be among those MPs who paid the highest amount to family members of between £40,000 and £45,000. He employs his wife Victoria as senior parliamentary assistant and he was the youngest Conservative elected in 1997, and currently resides in Altrincham in Greater Manchester
4.
Christopher Chope
–
Christopher Robert Chope OBE is a British barrister and Conservative politician. He is the Member of Parliament for Christchurch, Chope was called to the bar at the Inner Temple in 1972. Chope was elected as a councillor on the Wandsworth London Borough Council in 1974 and became the leader in 1979. He was awarded the OBE for his services to government in 1982. He was one of the pioneers in the selling off of council housing stock and aggressively reducing council spending, after his defeat, Chope took up a consultancy with Ernst & Young in 1992, but was re-elected at the 1997 general election for the Christchurch constituency. He returned to the frontbench after the 2001 election as a spokesman on the Treasury, in 2002, he moved to Transport, then left frontbench politics after the 2005 general election. He currently serves on the Panel of Chairs, Chope was chairman of the Thatcherite Conservative Way Forward group and used to be a barrister in the Chambers of Peter Rawlinson. On 10 February 2009, he called for the wage to be abolished. Later that year, in the scandal, it emerged that Chope claimed £136,992 in parliamentary expenses in 2007/08. This included claiming £881 to repair a sofa, on 12 March 2010, he was responsible for the blocking of a bill to protect poor countries from vulture funds, despite his partys support for the bill. In October 2010, Chope helped host a meeting of climate-science sceptics at Westminster, on 11 October 2011 Chope raised an eleventh hour objection to the Hillsborough debate taking place because he believed a debate about MPs pensions was more important. Cries of shame echoed around the chamber and Labour MP Jamie Reed said that the perpetrator should be named and shamed for raising the objection, Chope helped to lead the backbench support for the motion calling for a European Referendum. He has also heavily involved in the use of Private Members Bills to achieve this aim. Chope came under fire in January 2013 for referring to some staff in the House of Commons as servants, parallels were drawn between this opinion and his views on the minimum wage. Chope voted against the legislation for same-sex marriage in 2013,42 policies were listed including reintroduction of the death penalty and conscription, privatizing the BBC, banning the burka in public places and preparation to leave the European Union. The Daily Telegraph believed the whips sent Edward Leigh to try, in December 2013 Chope objected to the second reading of the Alan Turing Bill in the House of Commons. Because of this, the Government decided to act under the prerogative of mercy. On 24 December 2013 Queen Elizabeth II granted Turing a free pardon, november 28th 2014 Chope, a private landlord, filibustered a Lib Dem bill with cross party support intended to make revenge evictions an offence
5.
John Bercow
–
John Simon Bercow is a British politician who has been the Speaker of the House of Commons since June 2009. Prior to his election to Speaker, he was a member of the Conservative Party and he served as a councillor from 1986 to 1990 and unsuccessfully contested parliamentary seats in the 1987 and 1992 general elections. In the 1997 general election, Bercow was elected the MP for Buckingham and he held posts in the shadow cabinets of Iain Duncan Smith and Michael Howard. In November 2002, he resigned from the cabinet over disputes concerning the Adoption and Children Act. In September 2004, Bercow was sacked after disagreements with Howard, following the resignation of Speaker Michael Martin, Bercow announced his intention to stand for the Speakership election on 22 June 2009 and was successful. He remained Speaker and was re-elected in his constituency at the election on 7 May 2015. He was re-elected as Speaker, unopposed, when the House sat at the start of the new parliament on 18 May 2015, in 2014 Bercow was appointed Chancellor of the University of Bedfordshire. Bercow was born to an English Jewish family in Edgware, London and his paternal grandparents were Jews from Romania who arrived in England a century ago. The son of a driver, Bercow attended Frith Manor Primary School in Woodside Park, and Finchley Manorhill. In his youth, Bercow had been ranked Britains No.1 junior tennis player, Bercow graduated with a first-class honours degree in government from the University of Essex in 1985. Professor Anthony King said When he was a student here, he was very right-wing, pretty stroppy, as a young activist, Bercow was a member of the right-wing Conservative Monday Club, becoming secretary of its immigration and repatriation committee. However, at the age of 20 he left the club, in 1981, Bercow had stood as a candidate for the national executive of the Monday Club and called for a programme of assisted repatriation of immigrants. He has since then called his participation in the club utter madness, after graduating from the University of Essex, Bercow was elected as the last national chairman of the Federation of Conservative Students, 1986–87. After a spell in merchant banking, Bercow joined the lobbying firm Rowland Sallingbury Casey in 1988, with fellow Conservative Julian Lewis, Bercow ran an advanced speaking and campaigning course for over 10 years, which trained over 600 Conservatives in campaigning and communication techniques. He has also lectured in the United States to students of the Leadership Institute, in 1986, Bercow was elected as a Conservative councillor in the London Borough of Lambeth, and served for four years. In 1987, he was appointed the youngest deputy leader in the United Kingdom. In 1995, Bercow was appointed as an adviser to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury. After Aitkens resignation to fight an action, Bercow served as a special adviser to the Secretary of State for National Heritage
6.
Sylvia Heal
–
She served as the First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means and a Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons. She worked as a records clerk at the Chester Royal Infirmary for six years from 1957. In 1968 she was appointed as a worker with the Department of Employment for two years. For ten years from 1980 she worked as a worker within a drug rehabilitation centre. During her parliamentary interregnum she worked as a young officer with the National Carers Association from 1992-7. She was a member of the Young Socialists National Council for four years from 1960 and she was first elected to the House of Commons at the Mid Staffordshire by-election on 22 March 1990, which followed the suicide of the sitting Conservative MP John Heddle. She won the seat with a majority of 9,449 on a massive 21% swing from Conservative to Labour in a contest that was largely on the single issue of the Poll Tax. She lost the Mid Staffordshire seat two years later at the 1992 general election when she was ousted by the Conservative Michael Fabricant by a majority of 6,236, in her first spell in Parliament she served for two years as a member of the education select committee. She was also promoted to the front bench by Neil Kinnock in 1991 as a spokeswoman for health, following her re-election in 1997 she was appointed as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for Defence George Robertson and from 1999 his successor Geoff Hoon. She was appointed as a Deputy Speaker of the House in 2000, Sylvia Heal announced on 9 March 2010 that she would be stepping down at the 2010 general election, and was succeeded by Conservative James Morris as MP. Heal is the sister of Ann Keen, who was a Labour MP from 1997 to 2010, and sister-in-law to Alan Keen and she lives in Egham, Surrey, and she takes a keen interest in South Africa and enjoys gardening. com - Sylvia Heal MP BBC politics
7.
William Hague
–
William Jefferson Hague, Baron Hague of Richmond PC FRSL is a British Conservative politician and life peer. He represented Richmond, Yorkshire as Member of Parliament from 1989 to 2015, Hague was educated at Wath-upon-Dearne Grammar School, the University of Oxford and INSEAD, subsequently being returned to the House of Commons at a by-election in 1989. Hague quickly rose through the ranks of the government of John Major and was appointed to Cabinet in 1995 as Secretary of State for Wales. Following the Conservatives landslide defeat at the 1997 general election by the Labour Party and he returned to the backbenches, pursuing a career as an author, writing biographies of William Pitt the Younger and William Wilberforce. He also held several directorships, and worked as a consultant, after David Cameron was elected Leader of the Conservative Party in 2005, Hague was reappointed to the Shadow Cabinet as Shadow Foreign Secretary. He also assumed the role of Senior Member of the Shadow Cabinet, after the formation of the Coalition Government in 2010, Hague was appointed First Secretary of State and Foreign Secretary. Cameron described him as his de facto political deputy, Hague was elevated as a Life Peer in the 2015 Dissolution Honours List and created Baron Hague of Richmond, of Richmond in the County of North Yorkshire, on 9 October. Hague was born on 26 March 1961 in Rotherham, Yorkshire and he initially boarded at Ripon Grammar School and then attended Wath-upon-Dearne Comprehensive, a State-secondary school near Rotherham, previously Wath Grammar School. His parents, Nigel and Stella Hague, ran a soft drinks manufacturing business where he worked during school holidays and his childhood nurse, Bessie Camm, went on to be the oldest living person in Britain as of 2017, at age 112. He first made the news at the age of 16 by addressing the Conservatives at their 1977 Annual National Conference. In his speech he told the delegates, half of you wont be here in 30 or 40 years time, but that others would have to live with consequences of a Labour Government if it stayed in power. Hague read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Magdalen College, Oxford and he was President of the Oxford University Conservative Association, but was convicted of electoral malpractice in the election process. Hague was playing the game of using his powers as President to keep his faction in power. There were accusations of blatant ballot box stuffing and he also served as President of the Oxford Union, an established route into politics. After Oxford, Hague went on to study for a Master of Business Administration degree at INSEAD and he then worked as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company, where Archie Norman was his mentor. After Lamont was sacked in 1993, Hague moved to the Department of Social Security where he was Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, the following year he was promoted as Minister of State in the DSS with responsibility for Social Security and Disabled People. His fast rise up through Government was attributed to his intelligence and he continued serving in Cabinet until the Conservatives were replaced by New Labour at the 1997 general election. At the age of 36, Hague was tasked with rebuilding the Conservative Party by attempting to build a modern image
8.
Iain Duncan Smith
–
George Iain Duncan Smith, often referred to by his initials IDS, is a British Conservative Party politician. The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions from 2010 to 2016, he was previously the Leader of the Conservative Party, Duncan Smith was born in Edinburgh and served in the Scots Guards from 1975 to 1981, seeing tours in Northern Ireland and Rhodesia. Duncan Smith was the first Catholic to serve as a Conservative Leader, in 2010 The Tablet named him one of Britain’s most influential Catholics. Many Conservative MPs came to consider him incapable of winning an election when he was Conservative Party Leader, in 2003 his MPs passed a vote of no confidence in his leadership, he immediately resigned, and was succeeded by Michael Howard. Returning to the backbenches, he founded the centre-right Centre for Social Justice, a think tank independent of the Conservative Party, on 12 May 2010 the new Prime Minister, David Cameron, appointed Duncan Smith to serve in the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. He resigned from the Cabinet on 18 March 2016, in opposition to Chancellor George Osbornes proposed cuts to disability benefits, Duncan Smith was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1954. He is the son of W. G. G. Duncan Smith, a decorated Royal Air Force flying ace of World War II, and Pamela Summers, a ballerina, who were married in 1946. He is a descendant of Adam Duncan, the admiral who defeated the Dutch Navy at the Battle of Camperdown in 1797, Duncan Smith was educated at what is now St. In 1975 he attended the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and was commissioned into the Scots Guards, according to the BBC, Duncan Smiths biography on the Conservative Party website and his entry in Whos Who originally stated that he had studied at the University of Perugia in Italy. A BBC investigation in 2002 found this statement to be untrue, in response to the BBC story, Duncan Smiths office stated that he had in fact attended the Università per Stranieri, a different institution in Perugia, for a year. He did not complete his course of study, sit exams, dunchurch was the former staff college for GEC Marconi, for whom Duncan Smith worked in the 1980s. He was commissioned into the Scots Guards as a lieutenant on 28 June 1975. He was promoted to lieutenant on 28 June 1977, and retired from the military on 2 April 1981, at the 1987 general election Duncan Smith contested the constituency of Bradford West, where the incumbent Labour Party MP Max Madden retained his seat. At the 1992 general election he stood in the London constituency of Chingford, following the retirement of Conservative MP, a safe seat, he became a member of the House of Commons with a majority of nearly 15,000. A committed Eurosceptic, Duncan Smith became a constant thorn in the side of Prime Minister John Majors government of 1992 to 1997, Duncan Smith remained on the backbenches until 1997, when the new Conservative leader William Hague brought him into the Shadow Cabinet as Shadow Social Security Secretary. At the 1997 general election, boundary changes saw his constituency renamed Chingford and Woodford Green and his majority of 14,938 was reduced to 5,714. Duncan Smith realised the dangers that he and neighbouring Conservative MPs faced, so redoubled his efforts, I held on but everywhere around me went. In 1999, Duncan Smith replaced John Maples as Shadow Defence Secretary, William Hague resigned after the Labour Party returned to government in the 2001 general election with another large parliamentary majority
9.
Michael Howard
–
Michael Howard, Baron Howard of Lympne, CH, PC, QC is a British politician who served as the Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from November 2003 to December 2005. He studied at Peterhouse, Cambridge, following which he joined the Young Conservatives, in 1964 he was called to the Bar and became a Queens Counsel in 1982. He became a Member of Parliament in the 1983 General Election, representing the constituency of Folkestone and this quickly led to promotion and Howard became Minister for Local Government in 1987. Under John Major, he held cabinet positions including Secretary of State for Employment. In November 2003, following the Conservative Partys vote of no confidence in its leader Iain Duncan Smith, he was elected unopposed. In the 2005 General Election, the Conservatives gained 33 new seats in Westminster, including five from the Liberal Democrats, following the election, Howard resigned as Leader of the Conservative Party and was succeeded by David Cameron. Howard did not contest his seat of Folkestone and Hythe in the 2010 General Election, Howard was born Michael Hecht in Gorseinon, Swansea. He is the son of Bernat Hecht, who was born in Romania and his mother, Hilda, lived in Wales from the age of 6 months. Both of Howards parents were from Jewish families, when Howard was six, his parents became naturalised as British subjects, and his surname was also changed following the parents naturalisation with the new surname Howard. Howard passed his eleven-plus exam in 1952 and then attended Llanelli Boys Grammar School and he joined the Young Conservatives at age 15. He obtained eight O-levels and his subsequent A-levels earned him a place at Peterhouse at Cambridge University and he was President of the Cambridge Union Society in 1962. After taking a 2,1 in the first part of the tripos, he switched to law. Howard was called to the Bar at the Inner Temple in 1964 and specialised in employment, unlike his many Cambridge contemporaries, he continued his career at the Bar, becoming a practising Queens Counsel in 1982. The late 1960s saw Howards promotion within the Bow Group, where he became Chairman in April 1970, in the 1970s, Howard was a leading advocate of British membership of the Common Market and served on the board of the cross-party Britain in Europe group. Howard was named as co-respondent in the divorce case of 1960s model Sandra Paul. They have a son born in 1976 and a born in 1977. C. Which he has held since childhood, in June 1982, Howard was selected to contest the constituency of Folkestone and Hythe in Kent after the sitting Conservative MP, Sir Albert Costain, decided to retire. Howard won the seat at the 1983 general election and this junior post became very important, as he oversaw the Big Bang introduction of new technology in 1986
10.
Angela Browning
–
Angela Frances Browning, Baroness Browning is a British Conservative Party politician. She was the Member of Parliament for Tiverton and Honiton from 1997 to 2010, born Angela Frances Pearson in Reading, Berkshire, her father was a lab technician at the University of Reading. She was educated at the Westwood Grammar School for Girls on Honey End Lane in Reading, University of West London, and she became a Home Economics tutor in adult education from 1968 until 1974. She was a nurse for a year in 1976. She was appointed as a sales and training manager with GEC Hotpoint in 1977, in 1985, she became a self-employed management consultant, and also became Director of the Small Business Bureau until 1994. From 1988–92, she was the Chairman of Women into Business, Browning contested Crewe and Nantwich at the 1987 general election, but was narrowly defeated by the veteran Labour MP Gwyneth Dunwoody by just 1,092 votes. She was selected for the safe Conservative seat of Tiverton following the retirement of Robin Maxwell-Hyslop and she held the seat comfortably at the 1992 general election with a majority of 11,089. She made her speech on 12 June 1992. After her election, Browning became a Member of the Agriculture Select Committee in 1992 and she was appointed the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of State at the Department for Education and Employment Michael Forsyth in 1993. Also in 1993, she became the President of the National Autistic Society and she became a vice president of the National Alzheimers Disease Society in 1997. Her Tiverton seat was abolished, but she won the nomination for the newly drawn Tiverton and Honiton seat which she contested at the 1997 general election and she won the new seat with a majority of 1,653. After John Major resigned from the Leadership of the Conservative Party she ran the John Redwood campaign team and she was appointed as an opposition spokeswoman on Education and Employment under William Hague, but she stepped down in 1998 to look after her autistic adult son, Robin. However, Hague brought her back in 1999 when she entered the Shadow Cabinet as the Shadow Trade and Industry Secretary, after the 2001 general election, she was briefly an opposition spokesperson on Constitutional Affairs, before becoming the Vice Chairman of the Conservative Party 2000–04. In the 2005 general election, Browning increased her majority to 11,051 and she was a Member of both the Public Accounts and Standards and Privileges Select Committees. On 17 November 2006, Browning announced her intention not to stand as a candidate at the 2010 general election. On 9 July 2010, she was created a peer as Baroness Browning, of Whimple in the County of Devon, and was introduced in the House of Lords on 13 July 2010. Lady Browning also became the Home Office Minister of State in the House of Lords and she resigned from government on health grounds on 16 September 2011, and was replaced in the Home Office by Lord Henley. She married David Browning on 6 January 1968 in Bournemouth
11.
Bill Wiggin
–
William David Wiggin is a British Conservative Party politician, Member of Parliament and a former Shadow Minister for Agriculture & Fisheries. He held the seat of Leominster from the 2001 election until the 2010 election, Wiggin now holds the seat of North Herefordshire, having been elected in 2010. Wiggin was born in London in 1966 and he attended Eton College and later read Economics at the Bangor University, gaining a Bachelor of Arts in 1988. He also served in the Royal Welch Fusiliers in the TA, being a commander for Holyhead, Bangor. Wiggin was selected as the Conservative candidate for Burnley for the 1997 election and he came second to Peter Pike, who recorded a 17,062 majority over him. He was selected as the Conservative Party candidate in the seat of Leominster in April 1999, replacing Peter Temple-Morris. He won his seat in 2001 with a 10,367 majority over his Liberal Democrat opponent, initially a backbencher, he became a member of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs select committee in 2002. During 2003, Michael Howard appointed him to the position of Shadow Minister for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, in January 2009, Wiggin became a whip. He was re-elected at the 2005 general election with a 2. 4% swing in his favour, in the reshuffle following the election, he was moved to Shadow Minister of Agriculture & Fisheries, where he remained until the 2010 general election. Wiggin has voted against a ban on smoking in pubs and restaurants, the 2004 Hunting Bill. The candidate, Jim Miller, was disqualified by the returning officer and this left the Conservative candidate unopposed. According to The Telegraph, Miller was disqualified over a technicality that the previously told him had been resolved. The Mayor of Leominster expressed his astonishment at Wiggins intervention, I was just stunned that Wiggin contacted the returning officer, ” “It’s not totally blatant, but what in god’s name is an MP doing poking his nose into a little parish election. I can’t understand what he thinks he’s up to, in June 2013, Wiggin spoke in an Opposition Day debate in favour of the badger cull. In May 2015, Wiggin was re-elected once again increasing his share by 3. 9%. Following the election, Wiggin was initially set to contest the Chairmanship of the Environment, instead Wiggin was subsequently appointed as Chair of the Committee of Selection. As Chair of this Select Committee, Wiggin will also sit on the Liaison Committee which takes evidence from the Prime Minister, within his constituency, Wiggin successfully campaigned for improved broadband to rural areas, and helped to secure funding for a new swimming pool. In 2014 Wiggin met with Dafydd Evans, Environment Agency Area Manager for the West Midlands and it was then announced that £150,000 of work would take place in North Herefordshire over the following year
12.
Ribble Valley (UK Parliament constituency)
–
Ribble Valley is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 1992 by Nigel Evans, a Conservative. The Ribble Valley constituency was created in 1983 almost wholly from the seat of Clitheroe. Much of the part of the constituency lies within the historic county boundaries of the West Riding of Yorkshire. The constituency enjoys scenic villages for both commuters and the retired, and has higher than national average income and much lower than average reliance upon social housing. By December 2012, unemployment was lower than the national average. With the exception of one year when, following an by election, it was represented by a Liberal Democrat, the MP has been a Conservative, the lowest majority was 11. 6% in 1997. Six of the divisions on Lancashire County Council within the Ribble Valley Constituency after the United Kingdom local elections,2013 were Conservative, the Conservatives gained one division each from the LibDems and the Idle Toad parties, while Labour took one from the Conservatives. Labour also gained another Conservative seat that crosses the boundaries of the Ribble Valley, the Constituency comprises the whole of the Borough of Ribble Valley and a part of the Borough of South Ribble. In March 2015, two councillors, a Liberal Democrat and an Independent, defected to the Conservatives, since the May 2015 local elections the council has been composed of 35 Conservative,4 Liberal Democrat and 1 Labour councillors. 14 of the 19 South Ribble Borough Councillors within the Ribble Valley Constituency are Conservative and 5 are Labour,1983 to 1997, The Borough of Ribble Valley, and the Borough of Preston wards of Cadley, Greyfriars, Preston Rural East, and Sharoe Green. This creation caused major changes to seats including Ribble Valley, bringing a more urban element to the largely farming, list of Parliamentary constituencies in Lancashire Notes References Ribble Valley Borough Council official site
13.
Swansea
–
Swansea, officially known as the City and County of Swansea, is a coastal city and county in Wales. It is the second largest city in Wales after Cardiff, Swansea lies within the historic county boundaries of Glamorgan and the ancient Welsh commote of Gŵyr. Situated on the sandy South West Wales coast, the county includes the Gower Peninsula. According to its council, the City and County of Swansea had a population of 241,300 in 2014. During its 19th-century industrial heyday, Swansea was a key centre of the copper industry, archaeological finds are mostly confined to the Gower Peninsula, and include items from the Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age. The Romans reached the area, as did the Norsemen, Swansea is thought to have developed as a Viking trading post. Its English name may be derived from Sveinns island – the reference to an island may refer to a bank at the mouth of the river Tawe, an alternative explanation is that the name derives from the Norse name Sweyn and ey, which can mean inlet. This explanation supports the tradition that the city was founded by the Danish king Sweyn Forkbeard, the name is pronounced Swans-y /ˈswɒnzi/), not Swan-sea. The charter gave Swansea the status of a borough, granting the townsmen, a second charter was granted in 1215 by King John. In this charter, the name appears as Sweyneshe, the town seal which is believed to date from this period names the town as Sweyse. Following the Norman Conquest, a marcher lordship was created under the title of Gower and it included land around Swansea Bay as far as the River Tawe, the manor of Kilvey beyond the Tawe, and the peninsula itself. Swansea was designated chief town of the lordship and received a borough charter some time between 1158 and 1184, the port of Swansea initially traded in wine, hides, wool, cloth and later in coal. Smelters were operating by 1720 and proliferated, following this, more coal mines were opened and smelters were opened and flourished. Over the next century and a half, works were established to process arsenic, zinc and tin and to create tinplate, the city expanded rapidly in the 18th and 19th centuries, and was termed Copperopolis. However, the census understated Swanseas true size, as much of the area lay outside the contemporary boundaries of the borough. Swanseas population was overtaken by Merthyr in 1821 and by Cardiff in 1881. Through the 20th century, heavy industries in the town declined, leaving the Lower Swansea Valley filled with derelict works, the Lower Swansea Valley Scheme reclaimed much of the land. The present Enterprise Zone was the result and, of the original docks, only those outside the city continue to work as docks, North Dock is now Parc Tawe
14.
Wales
–
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, and it had a population in 2011 of 3,063,456 and has a total area of 20,779 km2. Wales has over 1,680 miles of coastline and is mountainous, with its higher peaks in the north and central areas, including Snowdon. The country lies within the temperate zone and has a changeable. Welsh national identity emerged among the Celtic Britons after the Roman withdrawal from Britain in the 5th century, Llywelyn ap Gruffudds death in 1282 marked the completion of Edward I of Englands conquest of Wales, though Owain Glyndŵr briefly restored independence to Wales in the early 15th century. The whole of Wales was annexed by England and incorporated within the English legal system under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542, distinctive Welsh politics developed in the 19th century. Welsh Liberalism, exemplified in the early 20th century by Lloyd George, was displaced by the growth of socialism, Welsh national feeling grew over the century, Plaid Cymru was formed in 1925 and the Welsh Language Society in 1962. Established under the Government of Wales Act 1998, the National Assembly for Wales holds responsibility for a range of devolved policy matters, two-thirds of the population live in south Wales, mainly in and around Cardiff, Swansea and Newport, and in the nearby valleys. Now that the countrys traditional extractive and heavy industries have gone or are in decline, Wales economy depends on the sector, light and service industries. Wales 2010 gross value added was £45.5 billion, over 560,000 Welsh language speakers live in Wales, and the language is spoken by a majority of the population in parts of the north and west. From the late 19th century onwards, Wales acquired its popular image as the land of song, Rugby union is seen as a symbol of Welsh identity and an expression of national consciousness. The Old English-speaking Anglo-Saxons came to use the term Wælisc when referring to the Celtic Britons in particular, the modern names for some Continental European lands and peoples have a similar etymology. The modern Welsh name for themselves is Cymry, and Cymru is the Welsh name for Wales and these words are descended from the Brythonic word combrogi, meaning fellow-countrymen. The use of the word Cymry as a self-designation derives from the location in the post-Roman Era of the Welsh people in modern Wales as well as in northern England and southern Scotland. It emphasised that the Welsh in modern Wales and in the Hen Ogledd were one people, in particular, the term was not applied to the Cornish or the Breton peoples, who are of similar heritage, culture, and language to the Welsh. The word came into use as a self-description probably before the 7th century and it is attested in a praise poem to Cadwallon ap Cadfan c. 633. Thereafter Cymry prevailed as a reference to the Welsh, until c.1560 the word was spelt Kymry or Cymry, regardless of whether it referred to the people or their homeland. The Latinised forms of names, Cambrian, Cambric and Cambria, survive as lesser-used alternative names for Wales, Welsh
15.
Conservative Party (UK)
–
The Conservative Party, officially the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a political party in the United Kingdom. It is currently the party, having won a majority of seats in the House of Commons at the 2015 general election. The partys leader, Theresa May, is serving as Prime Minister. It is the largest party in government with 8,702 councillors. The Conservative Party is one of the two major political parties in the United Kingdom, the other being its modern rival. The Conservative Partys platform involves support for market capitalism, free enterprise, fiscal conservatism, a strong national defence, deregulation. In the 1920s, the Liberal vote greatly diminished and the Labour Party became the Conservatives main rivals, Conservative Prime Ministers led governments for 57 years of the twentieth century, including Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. Thatchers tenure led to wide-ranging economic liberalisation, the Conservative Partys domination of British politics throughout the twentieth century has led to them being referred to as one of the most successful political parties in the Western world. The Conservatives are the joint-second largest British party in the European Parliament, with twenty MEPs, the party is a member of the Alliance of Conservatives and Reformists in Europe Europarty and the International Democrat Union. The party is the second-largest in the Scottish Parliament and the second-largest in the Welsh Assembly, the party is also organised in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. The Conservative Party traces its origins to a faction, rooted in the 18th century Whig Party and they were known as Independent Whigs, Friends of Mr Pitt, or Pittites. After Pitts death the term Tory came into use and this was an allusion to the Tories, a political grouping that had existed from 1678, but which had no organisational continuity with the Pittite party. From about 1812 on the name Tory was commonly used for the newer party, the term Conservative was suggested as a title for the party by a magazine article by J. Wilson Croker in the Quarterly Review in 1830. The name immediately caught on and was adopted under the aegis of Sir Robert Peel around 1834. Peel is acknowledged as the founder of the Conservative Party, which he created with the announcement of the Tamworth Manifesto, the term Conservative Party rather than Tory was the dominant usage by 1845. In 1912, the Liberal Unionists merged with the Conservative Party, in Ireland, the Irish Unionist Alliance had been formed in 1891 which merged anti-Home Rule Unionists into one political movement. Its MPs took the Conservative whip at Westminster, and in essence formed the Irish wing of the party until 1922. The Conservatives served with the Liberals in an all-party coalition government during World War I, keohane finds that the Conservatives were bitterly divided before 1914, especially on the issue of Irish Unionism and the experience of three consecutive election losses
16.
Alma mater
–
Alma mater is an allegorical Latin phrase for a university or college. In modern usage, it is a school or university which an individual has attended, the phrase is variously translated as nourishing mother, nursing mother, or fostering mother, suggesting that a school provides intellectual nourishment to its students. Before its modern usage, Alma mater was a title in Latin for various mother goddesses, especially Ceres or Cybele. The source of its current use is the motto, Alma Mater Studiorum, of the oldest university in continuous operation in the Western world and it is related to the term alumnus, denoting a university graduate, which literally means a nursling or one who is nourished. The phrase can also denote a song or hymn associated with a school, although alma was a common epithet for Ceres, Cybele, Venus, and other mother goddesses, it was not frequently used in conjunction with mater in classical Latin. Alma Redemptoris Mater is a well-known 11th century antiphon devoted to Mary, the earliest documented English use of the term to refer to a university is in 1600, when University of Cambridge printer John Legate began using an emblem for the universitys press. In English etymological reference works, the first university-related usage is often cited in 1710, many historic European universities have adopted Alma Mater as part of the Latin translation of their official name. The University of Bologna Latin name, Alma Mater Studiorum, refers to its status as the oldest continuously operating university in the world. At least one, the Alma Mater Europaea in Salzburg, Austria, the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, has been called the Alma Mater of the Nation because of its ties to the founding of the United States. At Queens University in Kingston, Ontario, and the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, British Columbia, the ancient Roman world had many statues of the Alma Mater, some still extant. Modern sculptures are found in prominent locations on several American university campuses, outside the United States, there is an Alma Mater sculpture on the steps of the monumental entrance to the Universidad de La Habana, in Havana, Cuba. Media related to Alma mater at Wikimedia Commons The dictionary definition of alma mater at Wiktionary Alma Mater Europaea website
17.
Swansea University
–
Swansea University is a public research university located in Swansea, Wales, United Kingdom. It was chartered as University College of Swansea in 1920, as the college of the University of Wales. In 1996, it changed its name to the University of Wales Swansea following structural changes within the University of Wales, Swansea University has two campuses located adjacent to the coast at the north of Swansea Bay. The Singleton Park Campus is set in the grounds of Singleton Park to the west of Swansea city centre, the Bay Campus which opened in September 2015, is located adjacent to Jersey Marine Beach to the east of Swansea city centre. It is the third largest university in Wales in terms of number of students and it currently offers about 330 undergraduate courses and 120 post-graduate courses to 17,445 undergraduate and postgraduate students. In 2014 Swansea was named University of the Year in the WhatUni. com Student Choice Awards, in 2016, Swansea University was named as the best university in Wales by The Times and The Sunday Times Good University Guide 2017 League Table. It was also awarded the inaugural Welsh University of the Year title, the university is divided between two campuses. The 46-acre Singleton Park campus, set in two miles west of Swansea city centre, houses the colleges of Arts and Humanities, Human and Health Sciences, Medicine, Science. It lies on the approach to the Gower Peninsula, the UK’s first Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. It lies three miles east of Swansea city centre in the County Borough of Neath Port Talbot, information Services and Systems has provided a combined library, IT and careers service for the university since 2011. In 2013, ISS received a renewed Customer Service Excellence award along with the universitys Registry and Student Services. Visitors can access a range of electronic resources, including 23,000 e-journals. There are over 1,000 study spaces, almost half of which are equipped with networked PCs, LIS was awarded the Charter Mark in 2006, and received the new Customer Service Excellence award in 2009. In 2013 it received a renewed Customer Service Excellence award in combination with the universitys Registry, morriston Hospital Nursing Library is also housed there. The 2,624 square-metre Bay Library is open round the clock to provide learning spaces for more than 650 students including 400 study spaces and silent study areas for a further 150 students. It holds 1, 800m of library stock, focused on Engineering and Management titles and has dedicated postgraduate rooms, a 30-seat computing and teaching room, Swansea Universitys £20 million International Sports Village is five minutes walk from the Singleton Park campus on the western side of Sketty Lane. The University also owns training pitches in the north of the city, in Fairwood, during the 2012 Summer Olympics, the University hosted the training camps for the Mexican and New Zealand Paralympic teams and the Ireland Triathlon team. In 2014, it hosted the IPC Athletics European Championships, furthermore, in 2015 it hosted the training camps of the Canada national rugby union team and the Fiji national rugby union team in preparation for the 2015 Rugby World Cup
18.
British people
–
British people, or Britons, are the citizens of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown dependencies, and their descendants. British nationality law governs modern British citizenship and nationality, which can be acquired, for instance, although early assertions of being British date from the Late Middle Ages, the creation of the united Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707 triggered a sense of British national identity. The notion of Britishness was forged during the Napoleonic Wars between Britain and the First French Empire, and developed further during the Victorian era, because of longstanding ethno-sectarian divisions, British identity in Northern Ireland is controversial, but it is held with strong conviction by unionists. Modern Britons are descended mainly from the ethnic groups that settled in the British Isles in and before the 11th century, Prehistoric, Celtic, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Norse. The British are a diverse, multi-national and multicultural society, with regional accents, expressions. Although none of his own writings remain, writers during the time of the Roman Empire made much reference to them, the group included Ireland, which was referred to as Ierne inhabited by the different race of Hiberni, and Britain as insula Albionum, island of the Albions. The term Pritani may have reached Pytheas from the Gauls, who used it as their term for the inhabitants of the islands. Greek and Roman writers, in the 1st century BC and the 1st century AD, name the inhabitants of Great Britain and Ireland as the Priteni, the origin of the Latin word Britanni. It has been suggested that name derives from a Gaulish description translated as people of the forms. By 50 BC Greek geographers were using equivalents of Prettanikē as a name for the British Isles. However, the term Britannia persisted as the Latin name for the island, during the Middle Ages, and particularly in the Tudor period, the term British was used to refer to the Welsh people and Cornish people. At that time, it was the held belief that these were the remaining descendants of the ancient Britons. This notion was supported by such as the Historia Regum Britanniae. Wales and Cornwall, and north, i. e. Cumbria, Strathclyde and this legendary Celtic history of Great Britain is known as the Matter of Britain. The indigenous people of the British Isles have a combination of Celtic, Norse, Anglo-Saxon, oppenheimer continues that the majority of the people of the British Isles share genetic commonalities with the Basques, ranging from highs of 90% in Wales to lows of 66% in East Anglia. Oppenheimers opinion is that. by far the majority of male gene types in the British Isles derive from Iberia, ranging from a low of 59% in Fakenham, Norfolk to highs of 96% in Llangefni, north Wales. The English had been unified under a single state in 937 by King Athelstan of Wessex after the Battle of Brunanburh. However, historian Simon Schama suggested that it was Edward I of England who was responsible for provoking the peoples of Britain into an awareness of their nationhood in the 13th century
19.
Speaker of the House of Commons (United Kingdom)
–
The Speaker of the House of Commons is the presiding officer of the House of Commons, the United Kingdoms lower chamber of Parliament. The office is held by John Bercow, who was initially elected on 22 June 2009. He was returned as an MP in the 2010 general election and was re-elected as Speaker when the House sat at the start of the new Parliament on 18 May 2010. He was again returned as an MP in the 2015 general election and was re-elected, unopposed, the Speaker presides over the Houses debates, determining which members may speak. The Speaker is also responsible for maintaining order during debate, the Speaker does not take part in debate or vote. Aside from duties relating to presiding over the House, the Speaker also performs administrative and procedural functions, the Speaker has the right and obligation to reside in Speakers House at the Palace of Westminster. The office of Speaker is almost as old as Parliament itself, the earliest year for which a presiding officer has been identified is 1258, when Peter de Montfort presided over the Parliament held in Oxford. Early presiding officers were known by the title parlour or prolocutor, Edward III was frail and in seclusion, his prestigious eldest son, Edward the Black Prince, terminally ill. It was left to the son, a furious John of Gaunt. He arrested De la Mare and disgraced other leading critics, in the next, Bad Parliament, in 1377, a cowed Commons put forward Gaunts steward, Thomas Hungerford, as their spokesman in retracting their predecessors misdoings of the previous year. On 6 October 1399, Sir John Cheyne of Beckford was elected speaker, the powerful Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Arundel, is said to have voiced his fears of Cheynes reputation as a critic of the Church. Eight days later, Cheyne resigned on grounds of ill-health, although he remained in favour with the king, in such a situation, the influence of the speaker should not be underestimated. Sir Thomas More was the first speaker to go on to become Lord Chancellor, until the 17th century, members of the House of Commons often continued to view their Speaker as an agent of the Crown. As Parliament evolved, however, the Speakers position grew into one that involved more duties to the House than to the Crown, such was definitely the case by the time of the English Civil War. This change is said to be reflected by an incident in 1642. The development of Cabinet government under King William III in the late 17th century caused further change in the nature of the Speakership, Speakers were generally associated with the ministry, and often held other government offices. For example, Robert Harley served simultaneously as Speaker and as a Secretary of State between 1704 and 1705, the Speaker between 1728 and 1761, Arthur Onslow, reduced ties with the government, though the office did remain to a large degree political. The Speakership evolved into its modern form—in which the holder is an impartial and apolitical officer who does not belong to any party—only during the middle of the 19th century, over 150 individuals have served as Speaker of the House of Commons
20.
European Union
–
The European Union is a political and economic union of 28 member states that are located primarily in Europe. It has an area of 4,475,757 km2, the EU has developed an internal single market through a standardised system of laws that apply in all member states. Within the Schengen Area, passport controls have been abolished, a monetary union was established in 1999 and came into full force in 2002, and is composed of 19 EU member states which use the euro currency. The EU operates through a system of supranational and intergovernmental decision-making. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community, the community and its successors have grown in size by the accession of new member states and in power by the addition of policy areas to its remit. While no member state has left the EU or its antecedent organisations, the Maastricht Treaty established the European Union in 1993 and introduced European citizenship. The latest major amendment to the basis of the EU. The EU as a whole is the largest economy in the world, additionally,27 out of 28 EU countries have a very high Human Development Index, according to the United Nations Development Programme. In 2012, the EU was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, through the Common Foreign and Security Policy, the EU has developed a role in external relations and defence. The union maintains permanent diplomatic missions throughout the world and represents itself at the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, the G7, because of its global influence, the European Union has been described as an emerging superpower. After World War II, European integration was seen as an antidote to the nationalism which had devastated the continent. 1952 saw the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community, the supporters of the Community included Alcide De Gasperi, Jean Monnet, Robert Schuman, and Paul-Henri Spaak. These men and others are credited as the Founding fathers of the European Union. In 1957, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and West Germany signed the Treaty of Rome and they also signed another pact creating the European Atomic Energy Community for co-operation in developing nuclear energy. Both treaties came into force in 1958, the EEC and Euratom were created separately from the ECSC, although they shared the same courts and the Common Assembly. The EEC was headed by Walter Hallstein and Euratom was headed by Louis Armand, Euratom was to integrate sectors in nuclear energy while the EEC would develop a customs union among members. During the 1960s, tensions began to show, with France seeking to limit supranational power, Jean Rey presided over the first merged Commission. In 1973, the Communities enlarged to include Denmark, Ireland, Norway had negotiated to join at the same time, but Norwegian voters rejected membership in a referendum
21.
Bachelor of Arts
–
A Bachelor of Arts is a bachelors degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both. Bachelor of Arts degree programs take three to four years depending on the country, academic institution, and specific specializations, majors or minors. The word baccalaureus or baccalarium should not be confused with baccalaureatus, degree diplomas generally are printed on high-quality paper or parchment, individual institutions set the preferred abbreviation for their degrees. In Pakistan, the Bachelor of Arts degree can also be attained within two years as an external degree, in colleges and universities in Australia, New Zealand, Nepal and South Africa, the BA degree can be taken over three years of full-time study. Unlike in other countries, students do not receive a grade for their Bachelor of Arts degree with varying levels of honours. Qualified students may be admitted, after they have achieved their Bachelors program with an overall grade point average. Thus, to achieve a Bachelor Honours degree, a postgraduate year. A student who holds a Honours degree is eligible for entry to either a Doctorate or a very high research Master´s degree program. Education in Canada is controlled by the Provinces and can be different depending on the province in Canada. Canadian universities typically offer a 3-year Bachelor of Arts degrees, in many universities and colleges, Bachelor of Arts degrees are differentiated either as Bachelors of Arts or as honours Bachelor of Arts degree. The honours degrees are designated with the abbreviation in brackets of. It should not be confused with the consecutive Bachelor of Arts degree with Honours, Latin Baccalaureatus in Artibus Cum Honore, BA hon. de jure without brackets and with a dot. It is a degree, which is considered to be the equivalent of a corresponding maîtrise degree under the French influenced system. Going back in history, a three-year Bachelor of Arts degree was called a pass degree or general degree. Students may be required to undertake a long high-quality research empirical thesis combined with a selection of courses from the relevant field of studies. The consecutive B. cum Honore degree is essential if students ultimate goal is to study towards a two- or three-year very high research masters´ degree qualification. A student holding a Baccalaureatus Cum Honore degree also may choose to complete a Doctor of Philosophy program without the requirement to first complete a masters degree, over the years, in some universities certain Baccalaureatus cum Honore programs have been changed to corresponding master´s degrees. In general, in all four countries, the B. A. degree is the standard required for entry into a masters programme, in science, a BA hons degree is generally a prerequisite for entrance to a Ph. D program or a very-high-research-activity master´s programme
22.
West Glamorgan
–
West Glamorgan is a preserved county and former administrative county of Wales, one of the divisions of the ancient county of Glamorgan. From 1982, the council offices were located in County Hall. Lliw Valley was partitioned between the two authorities, a West Glamorgan preserved county was created for the limited functions of Lieutenancy and High Shrievalty. The arms of West Glamorgan were, Argent three chevronels gules, between in chief two pine cones vert dimidiating as many gouttes sable, and in base a lozenge sable, the crest is a Welsh dragon holding a Tudor rose in its forepaws, rising above four gold cogwheels. The supporters are an osprey and a heron, both with a fish in their beaks, and wearing a chain round their necks, the osprey is standing on water, and the heron on a ploughed field. The motto is Cadarn pob cyfiawn, the chevronels derive from the arms of the de Clare family, the pine cones represent forestry, the black drops the oil industry, and the black lozenge, coal. Lord Lieutenant of West Glamorgan High Sheriff of West Glamorgan West Glamorgan constituencies
23.
Swansea West (UK Parliament constituency)
–
Swansea West is a constituency of the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The National Assembly for Wales constituency of the name presently has the same boundaries. Alan Williams represented the seat for the Labour Party from 1964 until his retirement in 2010, the constituency comprises the electoral wards of Sketty, Castle, Killay South, Killay North, Dunvant, Uplands, Townhill, Cockett and Mayals. 1 Geraint Davies is a Labour Co-operative Party member but he was nominated as Welsh Labour, general Election 1939/40, Another general election was required to take place before the end of 1940
24.
United Kingdom general election, 1987
–
The United Kingdom general election of 1987 was held on 11 June 1987, to elect 650 members to the British House of Commons. The Conservatives ran a campaign focusing on lower taxes, a strong economy and they also emphasised that unemployment had fallen below 3 million for the first time since 1981, and inflation was standing at 4%, its lowest level for some 20 years. The tabloid media also had support for the Conservatives, particularly The Sun. The Labour Party, led by Neil Kinnock, was moving towards a more centrist policy platform. Indeed, the Labour party succeeded in doing so with this general election, the Conservatives were returned to government, having suffered a net loss of only 21 seats, leaving them with 376 MPs. Labour succeeded in resisting the challenge by the SDP-Liberal Alliance to replace them as the main opposition, however, Labour still returned only 229 MPs to Westminster. The election was a disappointment for the SDP-Liberal Alliance, who saw their vote share fall and this led to the two parties eventually merging completely to become the Liberal Democrats. The election night was covered live on the BBC, and presented by David Dimbleby, Peter Snow and it was also broadcast on ITV and presented by Sir Alastair Burnet, Peter Sissons and Alastair Stewart. The 1987 General Election saw the election of the first post-war Black and Minority Ethnic Members of Parliament, Diane Abbott, Paul Boateng, Bernie Grant, and Ketih Vaz. The Conservatives campaign emphasized lower taxes, an economy, and defence. Norman Tebbit and Saatchi and Saatchi spearheaded the Conservative campaign and this was when, according to Youngs memoirs, Young got Tebbit by the lapels and shook him, shouting, Norman, listen to me, were about to lose this fucking election. In his memoirs Tebbit defends the Conservative campaign, We finished exactly as planned on the ground where Labour was weak and we were strong – defence, taxation, during the election campaign however Tebbit and Thatcher argued. The first Conservative party political broadcast played on the theme of Freedom and ended with a fluttering Union Jack, the hymn I Vow to Thee, My Country and the slogan, Its Great To Be Great Again. Labours first party political broadcast, dubbed Kinnock, The Movie, was directed by Hugh Hudson of Chariots of Fire fame, kinnocks personal popularity jumped 16 points overnight after the initial broadcast. The Conservatives were returned by a landslide victory with a comfortable majority. Yet the overall result of this proved that the policies of Margaret Thatcher retained significant support. Despite initial optimism and the professional campaign run by Neil Kinnock, in many southern areas, the Labour vote actually fell, with the party losing seats in London. However, it represented a victory against the SDP–Liberal Alliance
25.
Kim Howells
–
Kim Scott Howells is a Welsh Labour Party politician. He was the Member of Parliament for Pontypridd from 1989 to 2010, Howells is the son of Glanville Howells, a Communist lorry driver, and of Joan Glenys Howells. Born in Merthyr Tydfil, Wales and raised in Penywaun near Aberdare in the Cynon Valley, Howells later obtained a PhD from the University of Warwick in 1979 for a thesis entitled A view from below, tradition, experience and nationalism in the South Wales coalfield, 1937–1957. He joined the Labour Party in 1982, Howells ran the NUM Pontypridd office which co-ordinated the South Wales miners efforts during the UK miners strike. On being told of the incident in a call from a reporter of the South Wales Echo. He then destroyed a number of papers because he feared a police raid on the union offices. He has commented that the attack by the strikers was a result of pressure to get the miners to return to work. After the miners strike and the closure of 29 of the 30 National Coal Board pits in South Wales, Howells became a writer and presenter for television and radio, Howells entered the House of Commons in a by-election in 1989. As a member of the Labour Opposition, he became successively an Opposition Spokesman on Trade and Industry, on Home Affairs, on Foreign Affairs and on Development, Howells suggested in 1996 that the word socialism ought to be humanely phased out of Labour Party policy documents. He held a string of junior ministerial posts in various departments following the 1997 election until October 2008, from May 1997 to January 1998 he served as a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Education and Employment. He served as a Minister of State from June 2003 to September 2004 and he left that post when he was made Minister for the Middle East in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in May 2005. He remained a Minister of State at the Foreign Office after Gordon Brown became Prime Minister, in 2003 he said the Labour government was trying to run capitalism more efficiently and humanely. He is a member and the chairman of Labour Friends of Israel. In February 2009 Howells was appointed to the Privy Council, making him the Right Honourable Kim Howells, in March 2009 it was revealed that Howells made one of the lowest expense claims among Welsh MPs, being 5th from bottom. On 18 December 2009 Howells announced that he would stand down at the 2010 general election, on 15 July 2011 Dr Howells received an Honorary Doctorate for his contribution to Welsh and British politics from the University of Glamorgan. Howells withdrew from the ceremony at the last minute after pressure mounted on him, the NUS Wales Black Students Campaign described Dr Howells comments as reckless and said that the comments could add to the barriers facing Black and Minority Ethnic students in Wales. On 22 November 2006 it was announced that on a recent visit to Iraq his helicopter was involved in an incident as it left the city of Basra with witnesses claiming shots were fired at the aircraft, Howells served in various ministerial capacities. Notable legislation he introduced included the Licensing Act 2003 and the Communications Act 2003, Howells is known to be outspoken
26.
Pontypridd (UK Parliament constituency)
–
Pontypridd /pɒntəˈpriːð/ is a county constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It returns one Member of Parliament, elected by the first past the post system, Pontypridd has been represented by a succession of Labour MPs since 1922. Since the 2010 general election the seat has held by Owen Smith. Pontypridd constituency can be split into two parts, a part containing the town itself, and a western part focussed on Llantrisant. In Pontypridd itself the wards are, Town, Treforest, Rhondda, Graig, Trallwng, Rhydyfelin Central & Ilan, Hawthorn, Taffs Well. The Western half consists of the wards, Beddau, Church Village, Tonteg, Llantwit Fardre, Llantrisant, Pontyclun, Talbot Green, Tonyrefail East. This section has a population and is an important dormitory for Cardiff. However, in recent years, economic recovery has been firm, part of this Act also effected a General Redistribution of Seats on an equitable basis. It originally included the old Borough & Rural district of Cowbridge & the Urban district of Pontypridd plus the Rural District of Llantrisant & Llantwit Fardre, the constituency remained unchanged from this form until the Third Periodic Parliamentary Boundary Reviews proposals were implemented in 1983. However the communities of Creigiau and Pentyrch were added to the seat at this time, for the 2010 Election the Cilfyndd and Glyncoch electoral divisions were also removed from the seat, and added to the Cynon Valley constituency. Like many seats in South Wales, Pontypridd has been retained by the Labour party for over 90 years, the Fifth Periodic Parliamentary Boundary Review for Wales placed Cilfynydd & Glyncoch wards in the Cynon Valley & the Creigiau & Pentyrch wards in the Cardiff West. These changes were made & in place for the United Kingdom general election,2010, B The Total Electorate for the Constituency in June 1987 was 61,255. However, the Pentyrch & Creigiau communities were added to the new seat from the old Barry seat, D The Total Electorate for the newly reconstituted Constituency in June 1983 was 60,883. H The Total Electorate for the Constituency in May 1979 was 75,050, I The Total Electorate for the Constituency in October 1974 was 70,200. J The Total Electorate for the Constituency in February 1974 was 69,685, K The Total Electorate for the Constituency in June 1970 was 65,265. L The Total Electorate for the Constituency in March 1966 was 55,088, M The Total Electorate for the Constituency in October 1964 was 53,859. N The Total Electorate for the Constituency in October 1959 was 53,903, O The Total Electorate for the Constituency in May 1955 was 54,214. P The Total Electorate for the Constituency in October 1951 was 54,126, Q The Total Electorate for the Constituency in February 1950 was 53,275
27.
Ribble Valley
–
Ribble Valley is a local government district with borough status within the non-metropolitan county of Lancashire, England. The total population of the district at the 2011 Census was 57,132. Its council is based in Clitheroe, other places include Whalley, Longridge and Ribchester. The area is so called due to the River Ribble which flows in its final stages towards its estuary near Preston, the area is popular with tourists who enjoy the areas natural unspoilt beauty, much of which lies within the Forest of Bowland. Elections to the council are held every four years, with all of the 40 seats on the council being filled at each election. After being under no control for a number of years, the Conservative party gained a majority at the 2003 election. The project was launched in September 2004, the radio station helped 6 local residents into paid work within the radio sector in just 3 years and trained over 100 volunteers to present and produce their own radio shows. Many letters appeared in support of the project and damning the short sighted decision of the council, the whole episode brought excellent publicity and boosted the radio stations listening figures by 400%. MP Nigel Evans was a supporter and tabled an Early Day Motion at Parliament EDM979 calling for better resources and funding for Ribble Valley Radio. However Ribble Valley Radio closed down on 14 October 2007, the radio station closed as it was unable to gain sufficient funding to apply for a licence. A new group, known as Ribble FM, was formed in 2011 with the aim of applying for a community licence in the third round of licensing by Ofcom. Ribble FM was set up by The Bee founder Roy Martin and includes local directors, although Ribble Valley is the largest area of Lancashire, it also has the smallest population. The authority also has the highest proportion of people in Lancashire that work from home
28.
David Waddington, Baron Waddington
–
David Charles Waddington, Baron Waddington, GCVO, PC, QC, DL was a British politician and barrister. A member of the Conservative Party, he served as a Member of Parliament in the House of Commons from 1968 to 1974, and from 1979 to 1990, and was then made a life peer. During his parliamentary career, Waddington worked in government as Chief Whip, then as Home Secretary and he then served as the Governor of Bermuda between 1992 and 1997. Waddington was born in Burnley, Lancashire, the youngest of five and his father and grandfather were both solicitors in Burnley. He was educated at Cressbrook School and Sedbergh School, both independent schools and he then attended Hertford College, Oxford, where he became President of the Oxford University Conservative Association. He was called to the Bar at Grays Inn in 1951, in 1976, Waddington led the defence in the trial of Stefan Kiszko, a case which became a significant miscarriage of justice. The British tax clerk from Rochdale, who was convicted of the murder of 12-year-old Lesley Molseed, served sixteen years in prison for a crime he did not commit and it is alleged that this was because Kiszkos defence team made significant mistakes. Firstly, they did not seek an adjournment when the Crown delivered thousands of pages of additional unused material on the first morning of the trial. Waddington recalled, the material did not include the results of tests on Mr Kiszkos semen which were then in the hands of the Police. Secondly, it was alleged that, in court, Waddington maintained a defence of diminished responsibility which Kiszko had never authorised, Waddington stated that this assertion runs counter to what Kiszkos new counsel told the Court of Appeal. Stephen Sedley said that I am now satisfied that advice had been given to Mr Kiszko. Kiszko was finally released in 1992, after the Court of Appeal was told forensic evidence showed that he could not have been the murderer, Waddington stood for election several times before being successful. He was the Conservative candidate at Farnworth in the 1955 general election, at Nelson and Colne in 1964 and he was first elected to Parliament at the 1968 Nelson and Colne by-election, caused by the death of Labour MP Sydney Silverman. He was re-elected there in 1970 and in February 1974, Waddington was returned to Parliament for Clitheroe at the by-election in March 1979, and was subsequently elected for the broadly similar Ribble Valley constituency in 1983. On 4 December 1990, he was created a peer as Baron Waddington. He served as Lord Privy Seal and Leader of the House of Lords until 1992 and he then served as Governor of Bermuda from 1992 until 1997. Lord Waddington was appointed a Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order in 1994, in 2008, his amendment to the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill, known as the Waddington Amendment, inserted a freedom of speech clause into new anti-homophobic hate crime legislation. In November 2009, the Government failed to repeal the Waddington Amendment in the Coroners, on 26 March 2015, Lord Waddington retired from the House of Lords pursuant, to Section 1 of the House of Lords Reform Act 2014
29.
Leader of the House of Lords
–
The Leader of the House of Lords is a member of the Cabinet of the United Kingdom who is responsible for arranging government business in the House of Lords. The role is held in combination with a formal Cabinet position, usually one of the sinecure offices of Lord President of the Council. Unless the Leader is also a minister, being Leader constitutes the bulk of his or her government responsibilities. The Office of the Leader of the House of Lords is a ministerial department, though the Leader of the House is a member of the cabinet and remains a partisan figure, he or she also has responsibilities to the House as a whole. In contrast to the House of Commons, where proceedings are controlled by the Speaker, proceedings in the Lords are controlled by peers themselves, under the rules set out in the Standing Orders. The Leader is often called upon to advise on procedures and points of order, however, like the Lord Speaker, the Leader of the House has no power to rule on points of order or to intervene during an inappropriate speech. Those functions were transferred to the Lord Speaker, however, it may have been used as early as 1689, applied to George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax, when he was Speaker of the House of Lords during the Convention Parliament of that year. The role developed during the first quarter of the century, at the same time as the role of Prime Minister. It was therefore necessary for a member of the government to take responsibility for steering government legislation through each House, the Earl of Sunderland, initiated aspects of the role during the Whig Junta under Queen Anne. Sunderland and the other Whigs were dismissed from office in reaction to their co-ordination of government matters, Sunderland returned to power under George I, as Lord Privy Seal. When the Prime Minister sat in the House of Lords, which was common until the beginning of the twentieth century, when the Prime Minister sat in the Commons, the position of Leader of the Lords was often held by the Foreign Secretary or Colonial Secretary. In some coalition governments, it was held by the party leader who was not Prime Minister, since the end of the Marquess of Salisburys last government, in 1902, the position clearly exists in its own right as a member of the cabinet. The first female Leader of the Lords was Janet Young, Baroness Young in 1981–1983, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury served as Leader of the House of Lords from 1885 to 1886, from 1886 to 1892 and from 1895 to 1902. His son James Gascoyne-Cecil, 4th Marquess of Salisbury served as Leader from 1925 to 1929 and his grandson, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 7th Marquess of Salisbury, served as Leader from 1994 to 1997, as Viscount Cranborne, again by means of a writ of acceleration. Douglas Hogg, 1st Viscount Hailsham served as Leader of the House of Lords from 1931 to 1935 and his son Quintin Hogg, 2nd Viscount Hailsham served as Leader from 1960 to 1963. Because the post is a one and not a ministerial office in its own right, it is not always included in official lists of government offices. This can make it difficult to determine who the Leader of the House of Lords was in a particular ministry, House of Lords Leader of the House of Commons Leader of the House of Lords Official site
30.
Liberal Democrats (UK)
–
The Liberal Democrats are a liberal political party in the United Kingdom. The party was formed in 1988 as a merger of the Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party, at the 2015 general election, the party was reduced to eight MPs. Nick Clegg resigned as leader and Tim Farron won the subsequent leadership election, the party currently has nine MPs, following the Richmond Park by-election. The Alliance was led by David Steel and Roy Jenkins, Jenkins was replaced by David Owen, the two parties had their own policies and emphases, but produced a joint manifesto for the 1983 and 1987 general elections. Following disappointing results in the 1987 election, Steel proposed to merge the two parties, although opposed by Owen, it was supported by a majority of members of both parties, and they formally merged in March 1988, with Steel and Robert Maclennan as joint interim leaders. The new party was initially named Social and Liberal Democrats with the short form The Democrats being used from September 1988. The name was changed to Liberal Democrats in October 1989. The new party logo, the Bird of Liberty, was adopted in 1989, the party is a member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party and Liberal International. The then-serving Liberal MP Paddy Ashdown was elected leader in July 1988, at the 1989 European Elections, the party received only 6% of the vote, putting them in fourth place after the Green Party. They failed to gain a single Member of the European Parliament at this election, over the next three years, the party recovered under Ashdowns leadership. They performed better at the 1990 local elections and in by-elections—including at Eastbourne in 1990, Ribble Valley in 1991, the Lib Dems did not reach the share of national votes in the 1990s that the Alliance had achieved in the 1980s. At their first election in 1992, they won 17. 8% of the vote, in the 1994 European Elections, the party gained its first two Members of European Parliament. The election was, however, something of a point for the Liberal Democrats. Ashdown retired as leader in 1999 and the party elected Charles Kennedy as his replacement, the party improved on their 1997 results at the 2001 general election, increasing their number of seats to 52 and their share of the vote to 18. 3%. The party won seats from Labour in by-elections in Brent East in 2003 and Leicester South in 2004, under Kennedys leadership the majority of Pro-Euro Conservatives, a group of former members of the Conservatives, joined the Liberal Democrats on 10 December 2001. At the 2005 general election, the Lib Dems gained their highest share of the vote since the SDP–Liberal Alliance and won 62 seats. Many had anticipated that this election would be the Lib Dems breakthrough at Westminster, party activists hoped to better the 25% support of the 1983 election, or to reach 100 MPs. Much of the apparent lack of success resulted from the first-past-the-post electoral system, controversy became associated with the campaign when it became known that Michael Brown had donated £2.4 million to the Liberal Democrats
