David Gibson-Watt, Baron Gibson-Watt

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James David Gibson-Watt, Baron Gibson-Watt PC MC DL ( September 11, 1918 - February 7, 2002 in Llandrindod Wells , Powys ) was a British Conservative Party politician who was a member of the House of Commons for 18 years and 1979 when Life Peer became a member of the House of Lords under the Life Peerages Act 1958 .

Life

Studies and war hero in World War II

Gibson-Watt, whose father James Miller Gibson-Watt recently Vice Lord Lieutenant of Hampshire , was completed after the visit of Eton College to study at Trinity College of the University of Cambridge .

Shortly after the start of the Second World War , he began his military service in the Welsh Guards in October 1939 as a second lieutenant . During the African campaign he was chief of the 4th  Company of the 3rd  Battalion of the Welsh Guards and as such took part in an attack on Hammam-Lif in Tunisia in May 1943 , in which he led his unit through a heavy battle despite being wounded. He was awarded the Military Cross (MC) for his bravery and leadership quality.

In early 1944 Gibson-Watt took part in the defense of Monte Cerasola during the Battle of Monte Cassino , where he was awarded a military cross clasp for his services in a successful counterattack on February 9, 1944. Two months later he led the 4th Company in a battle on the Po and received a second clasp for the Military Cross for his leadership quality and his almost reckless courage. Most recently, he was promoted to major and was an instructor at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst until he retired in 1946 .

Member of the House of Commons

He then began his political career in local politics when he for the Conservative Party Council member of the County Radnorshire ( Radnorshire County Council ) has been selected.

A few years later he was nominated as a candidate of the Conservative Tories for the general election on February 23, 1950 in the constituency of Brecon and Radnorshire . There he fought a vigorous election campaign with the Labor Party candidate , Tudor Watkins , which Watkins was ultimately able to win over another independent liberal candidate with a narrow majority. In the general election of October 25, 1951 , Gibson-Watt ran again against Tudor Watkins in the constituency of Brecon and Radnorshire , but was defeated again, although Watkins' lead was even narrower.

After the former First Lord of the Admiralty James Thomas was appointed 1st Viscount Cilcennin 1955, ran Gibson-Watt as his successor at a special election ( by-election ) on 15 February 1956 at Constituency Hereford for a lower house mandate and could with 12,129 votes (44.3%) prevail against the candidate of the Liberal Party Humphrey Frank Owen , who got 9,979 votes (36.4%). However, compared to the last election by James Thomas, Gibson-Watt lost 7.5 percentage points. He held the mandate in the lower house until the general election on October 10, 1974 .

Junior minister

A few months later Gibson-Watt took over his first government office as Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Undersecretary of State in the War Ministry Julian Amery and was also Assistant Parliamentary Secretary ( Assistant Whip ). In October 1959 he was Whip the faction of the Conservative Party in the House of Commons and Lord Commissioner of the Treasury and thus one of the Junior Lords of the HM Treasury . He resigned from these offices in late November 1961 to play a more important role in the backbenchers .

During an illness of Anthony Barber , he was his representative in 1962 temporarily Parliamentary Private Secretary of Prime Minister Harold Macmillan , before he served as Parliamentary Private Secretary of Chancellor Reginald Maudling between 1962 and 1964 .

After the election defeat of the Conservative Tories in the general election of October 15, 1964 , Gibson-Watt was the opposition spokesman for the post of General Postmaster and the Ministry of Wales. In the latter capacity, he held the opposition leader Edward Heath on visits to Wales. In 1968 he was still Deputy Lieutenant of Radnorshire .

Minister of State in the Department for Wales

After the Conservative Party emerged victorious in the general election of June 18, 1970 , the new Prime Minister Edward Heath Gibson-Watt appointed Minister of State in the Ministry of Wales ( Welsh Office ). As such, he was to the end of Heath's tenure after the general election of 28 February 1974 closest collaborator of the then Minister of Wales ( Secretary of State for Wales ), Peter Thomas .

Gibson-Watt did not support devolution , but accepted that the Welsh Office had become a permanent part of government. One of his tasks was to chair the Welsh Grand Committee , in which he was repeatedly exposed to verbal attacks from representatives of the Labor Party there. At the end of his tenure, he had to undergo an operation, and therefore decided not to run again for a seat in the lower house in the general election on October 10, 1974.

In the following years he repeatedly underlined the achievements of the Heath government for Wales in the years 1970 to 1974 and vehemently rejected criticism directed against it. In a letter to the newspaper The Times of 11 June 1975, he recalled that the Heath government had achieved the following improvements for Wales: the dissolution of the Rural Development Agency for Central Wales ( Mid-Wales Rural Development Board ), saving the valleys Senny and Dulais before the flood, the establishment of the Welsh Language Advisory Committee , the transfer of responsibility for primary and secondary education to the Wales Department and the issuance of an initial report on stray animals in the valleys of South Wales.

On April 5, 1974, he also became Privy Councilor (PC).

Engagement in organizations and member of the upper house

After retiring from political life, Gibson-Watt, who raised Welsh Black cattle as a landowner in Central Wales and was already chairman of the Livestock Export Council between 1962 and 1964 , was involved in numerous organizations and was among others from 1975 to 1979 Member of the Historic Buildings Council Wales .

He was also from 1976 to 1986 Forestry Commissioner based on the Forestry Act 1967 ( Forestry Act 1967 ). In addition, he was first president in 1976 and then between 1977 and 1994 chairman of the Royal Welsh Agricultural Society ( Royal Welsh Agricultural Society ).

At the end of the 1970s he was involved in the so-called “No Assemly Campaign” and advocated that Wales should not receive its own independent parliamentary assembly in a referendum on March 1, 1979.

By a letters patent dated September 7, 1979, Gibson-Watt was raised to the nobility as a life peer with the title Baron Gibson-Watt , of the Wye in the District of Radnor, under the Life Peerages Act 1958 and belonged to him until his death House of Lords as a member. The official introduction ( Introduction ) took place on November 7, 1979 with the support of Cameron Cobbold, 1st Baron Cobbold and Michael Noble, Baron Glenkinglas .

Shortly thereafter, he was lord chancellor Quintin Hogg in 1980 as Chairman of the Council on Tribunals called and held this position until 1986. He also served for several years as a magistrate ( justice of the peace ) for Rhayader . He was also Chairman from 1989 to 1990 and later Honorary President of the United Kingdom Timber Growers between 1993 and 1998 .

His marriage on January 10, 1942 to Diana Hambro, a daughter of the politician and officer Charles Jocelyn Hambro , had five children, including his youngest daughter Sián Diana Gibson-Watt, who was born in 1962 and who with Nicholas Biddulph between 1993 and her divorce in 2001 , 5th Baron Biddulph was married.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 34743, HMSO, London, November 28, 1939, p. 8022 ( PDF , accessed December 21, 2013, English).
  2. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 36083, HMSO, London, July 6, 1943, p. 3088 ( PDF , accessed December 21, 2013, English).
  3. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 37235, HMSO, London, 23 August 1945, p. 4267 ( PDF , accessed on 21 December 2013, English).
  4. ↑ London Gazette . No. 41860, HMSO, London, November 3, 1959, p. 6941 ( PDF , accessed December 21, 2013, English).
  5. ↑ Lord Commissioner of the Treasury (Hansard)
  6. ↑ London Gazette . No. 44723, HMSO, London, November 26, 1968, p. 12677 ( PDF , accessed December 21, 2013, English).
  7. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 46254, HMSO, London, April 2, 1974, p. 4395 ( PDF , accessed December 21, 2013, English).
  8. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 47092, HMSO, London, December 14, 1976, p. 16775 ( PDF , accessed December 21, 2013, English).
  9. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 47888, HMSO, London, June 26, 1979, p. 1 ( PDF , accessed December 21, 2013, English).
  10. ↑ London Gazette . No. 47953, HMSO, London, September 13, 1979, p. 11559 ( PDF , accessed December 21, 2013, English).
  11. ↑ Entry in Hansard (November 7, 1979)
personal data
SURNAME Gibson-Watt, David, Baron Gibson-Watt
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gibson-Watt, James David, Baron Gibson-Watt (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British politician, member of the House of Commons
DATE OF BIRTH September 11, 1918
DATE OF DEATH February 7, 2002
Place of death Llandrindod Wells