Antony Lambton

Antony Lambton, 1991

Antony Claud Frederick Lambton (born July 10, 1922 in County Durham , † December 30, 2006 in Sovicille , Italy ) was a British Conservative politician , Member of the House of Commons and Parliamentary Undersecretary of State in the Ministry of Defense of the United Kingdom .

biography

Family and Member of the House of Commons

The son of John Frederick Lambton, 5th Earl of Durham , grew up on the family estate Lambton Castle in County Durham and stepped after visiting the Harrow School during the Second World War as a soldier in the Hampshire Regiment one before it due to incapacity was retired . Subsequently, however, he did military service in a factory in Wallsend . Since the death of his older brother in 1941, he carried the courtesy title Viscount Lambton as his father's Heir Apparent . His marriage to Belinda Bridget Blew-Jones (1912-2003) in 1942 resulted in five daughters and one son. He was also the cousin of the future Prime Minister Alec Douglas-Home .

He began his political career in 1945 unsuccessfully as a candidate for the election to the House of Commons in the traditional Labor constituency of Chester-le-Street , and in the subsequent election in 1950 in the constituency of Bishop Auckland . In the meantime he was from 1947 to 1949 a member of the City Council of Durham (City Council) and the County Council (Durham County Council).

In 1951 he was elected MP from Berwick-upon-Tweed in the general election and represented the interests of the Conservative Party in the House of Commons until 1973 . In 1960 he was Parliamentary Private Secretary to Foreign Minister Selwyn Lloyd for some time .

When his father died on February 4, 1970, he inherited his title as 6th Earl of Durham . In order not to have to give up his seat in the House of Commons in favor of a seat in the House of Lords , he renounced his title of nobility on February 23, 1970 under the Peerage Act 1963 . However, he initially insisted on being addressed with his previous courtesy title Viscount Lambton , until a decision by the Committee on Privileges prohibited him from doing so due to the renunciation of his peer title .

Undersecretary of State and resignation due to prostitution scandal

After the election victory of the Conservatives on June 19, 1970, Prime Minister Edward Heath appointed him Parliamentary Undersecretary in the Ministry of Defense , where he was responsible for the Royal Air Force .

In 1973 the News of the World tabloid reported on his relationships with prostitutes . The prostitute's husband, Norma Levy, took secret photos of Lambton in bed with his wife and then offered them to the Fleet Street tabloids . In addition, police officers found a small amount of cannabis in Lambton's house . On May 22, 1973, Lambton resigned as Undersecretary of State and at the same time renounced his House of Commons, which was then won in a by-election by Liberal Party candidate Alan Beith . Two days later, further relationships between the prostitutes around Norma Levy and George Jellicoe, 2nd Earl Jellicoe , the Lord Seal Keeper and leader of the House of Lords in the Cabinet of Heath became known. This ultimately led to Jellico's resignation.

A secret investigation that followed found that Lambton was not a security risk because of his relationship with Norma Levy. Lambton himself stated that, in particular, he never carried any government documents with him when he visited the prostitutes. The secret investigation was carried out in particular because parallelism to the Profumo affair in 1963 was seen as a possible threat to national security. First of all, in his interrogations at the Security Service (MI 5), he stated that the pressure in his undersecretary's office led to the visits to the prostitutes. However, he later admitted that the real reason for the visits was the futility of his office and the small workload as junior minister.

After the scandal and his resignation, he separated from his wife. He then bought Villa Cetinale, a 400-year-old villa in Tuscany , in 1977 , where he lived for the following years with Claire Ward, the daughter of the English cricketer Giles Baring. In doing so, he increasingly developed into a recognized garden and landscape expert. However, there was no divorce from his first wife, who died in 2003.

When he died in 2006, his title of nobility revived and passed to his son as the 7th Earl.

swell

• Disgraced peer Lord Lambton dies, age 84 , obituary Daily Mail December 31, 2006
• Lord Lambton of 1973 Scandal Dies at 84 , Washington Post Obituary January 2, 2007
• Lord Louche, sex king of Chiantishire. Loins, lions and lovelies had the run of the house of disgraced minister Lord Lambton who died last week , obituary TIMES January 7, 2007

Individual evidence

1. ^ "'Bindy' Lambton" , Telegraph obituary February 18, 2003
2. ^ Loss of office in the Ministry of Defense
3. ^ "A Case of Peers and Playgirls" , TIME Magazine June 4, 1973
4. ^ "Call girls, drugs and Ugandan affairs shook cabinet. Ministers in the Heath government had to quit," The Guardian January 1, 2004
5. ^ "Call girl who nearly toppled a government reveals all," Daily Mail January 26, 2007
6. ↑ British Political Scandals  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.