Bernard Weatherill

Bruce Bernard "Jack" Weatherill, Baron Weatherill (born November 25, 1920 in Malvern (Worcestershire) , † May 6, 2007 in Caterham (Surrey) ) was a British Conservative politician and long-time speaker of the House of Commons .

Family, World War II and professional career

After graduating from Malvern College , he trained as a tailor at his family's business on Savile Row , Mayfair .

A few days after the start of World War II , he joined the British Army as a private in 1939 . After only a year he was promoted to officer and then transferred to a regiment in India and later to Burma . There he was promoted to captain in 1943 . One year after the war ended, he was retired from military service in 1946.

Then he stepped back into the family business where he first, and finally in 1948 Director 1958 Executive Director 1967 Managing Director rise. After merging with another tailoring company, he was managing director of this new company from 1969 to 1992. From 1992 until the takeover by another fashion company in 2003, he was president of the company. Weatherill also worked as a designer . Some of his collections were on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum .

Political career

MP and Whip

Weatherill was first elected a member of the House of Commons in the general election on October 15, 1964 . There he was re-elected seven times and until 1992 represented the interests of the Conservative Party of the constituency of Croydon North East . Just three years later he was whip his party in the lower house in 1967 .

From October 1971 to April 1973 he was Whip Vice Chamberlain or Controller of the Royal Household. In this capacity he reported to Queen Elizabeth II at the end of the parliamentary session on the speeches and the content of the debates.

In April 1973 he became First Deputy Whip of the Conservative Party and Treasurer of the Royal Household. He held this office until the resignation of Prime Minister Edward Heath in 1974.

Speaker of Parliament

After Weatherill was initially Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons after Margaret Thatcher's election victory of the Conservative Party in 1979, he was elected in 1983 at the beginning of Thatcher's second term against their will as the successor to George Thomas as the 154th Speaker of the House of Commons. He was able in particular to the voices of backbenchers trust (Backbencher). Thatcher himself had favored the former Lord Seal Keeper and former Deputy Secretary of State Humphrey Atkins as Speaker of the House of Commons.

In this position he introduced the broadcast of the debates and question times on television, which contributed to his notoriety beyond the UK. At the same time he was the last speaker of parliament to wear a wig during the sessions. In 1992 he resigned as Speaker of the House of Commons. For the first time in the 727-year history of Parliament, a woman, Betty Boothroyd, was elected as his successor .

Member of the House of Lords

After his resignation as speaker, he was raised to the nobility in 1992 as a peer for life with the title Baron Weatherill (of North East Croydon in the Borough of Croydon) . Thus he was simultaneously a member of the upper house ( House of Lords ).

As such, due to his previous position as Speaker of the House of Commons, he did not belong to any particular party, but to the neutral Crossbenchers . From 1993 to 1995 he was initially Deputy Convenor and then from 1995 to 1999 Convenor (convener) and thus practically the leader of the Crossbencher. Through this office he played a key role in the passage of the House of Lords Act 1999 . In 2006 he was still one of the patrons of the Better Off Cut campaign, an initiative supported by several members of parliament for Great Britain to leave the European Union .

Awards and honorary positions

In 1980 he was appointed to the Privy Council (PC), an advisory body to the British monarch. In addition, he was made an Honorary Citizen of the London Borough of Croydon in 1983 and an Honorary Citizen of the City of London in 1989 . From 1983 to 2000 he was Vice Chancellor of the Order of Saint John from Jerusalem , whose Knight he became in 1992. Also in 1992 he was raised to the nobility as a life peer . Between 1989 and 1998 he also held the honorary offices of High Bailiff and Searcher of the Sanctuary at Westminster Abbey . Lord Weatherill, who spoke Urdu fluently because of his military service , was awarded the Order of the Crescent of Pakistan (Hilal-i-Pakistan) in 1993 . In 1994 he became the Deputy Lieutenant of the County of Kent .

Web links

Commons : Bernard Weatherill  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

• Biography on the homepage of the convenors of the backbenchers of the House of Lords ( Memento from August 11, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
• "After The Week That Was", article in TIME magazine on June 27, 1983
• Obituary in BBC News on May 7, 2007
• Obituary in "The Scotsman" on May 8, 2007
• Appreciations in the House of Lords (meeting of May 8, 2007)