John Redcliffe-Maud, Baron Redcliffe-Maud

John Primatt Redcliffe-Maud, Baron Redcliffe-Maud , GCB , CBE (born February 3, 1906 in Bristol , † November 20, 1982 ) was a British civil servant , minister and diplomat .

Political career

Communal subdivision of England as proposed in the Redcliffe-Maud Report

John Redcliffe-Maud was educated at Eton and New College , Oxford . At Oxford he was also a member of the Oxford University Dramatic Society . In 1928 he received a one-year scholarship to Harvard and was from 1929 to 1939 a fellow at University College , Oxford.

During the Second World War , Redcliffe-Maud was a Master of Birkbeck College at the University of London and was also stationed in Reading Gaol , where he worked for the Department of Food. In 1942 he became Commander of the Order of the British Empire . From 1945 to 1952 he worked for the Ministry of Education, rose to Ministerialrat until 1958 and finally to Minister of Energy. In 1946 he was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath and in 1955 Knight Grand Cross . From 1959 to 1961 he was High Commissioner to the Union of South Africa and after 1961 Ambassador when the country left the Commonwealth . In 1976 Redcliffe-Maud resigned as a Masters from University College .

In March 1964, at the request of local associations, Sir Keith Joseph appointed Redcliffe-Maud to head a specialized committee to review the administration of local governments. Three years later, the Maud Committee presented its report. During this time, Redcliffe-Maud was also appointed head of a Royal Commission that was supposed to reform local councils. In 1969 the Royal Commission Report , commonly known as the Redcliffe-Maude Report , was published. The report recommended a comprehensive reform of communal boundaries and the establishment of larger unified municipalities based on the principle of mixing rural and urban areas. The recommendations were accepted with few changes by the Labor government under Harold Wilson . The opposition from the rural areas convinced the conservatives to vote against the plan, so that nothing was done until the next election in 1970 .

In 1967 John Redcliffe-Maud was named a Life Peer with the title Baron Redcliffe-Maude of the City and County of Bristol . In 1973 he was portrayed by Ruskin Spear , the painting is on display in the National Portrait Gallery in London . Another portrait of him hangs in the hall of University College Oxford.

Private

Entrance to Redcliffe-Maud House in Oxford

John Redcliffe-Maud was married to the pianist Jean Hamilton . His son, Humphrey Maud , was one of several underage boys with whom the homosexual British composer Benjamin Britten became friends, a relationship his father eventually broke. The children of John and Jean Maud are dedicators of Britten's composition The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra .

Redcliffe-Maud is buried in Holywell Cemetery , Oxford. His archive is in the library of the London School of Economics . An extension of University College Oxford was named Redcliffe-Maud House after him.

Fonts

• Experiences of an Optimist: The Memoirs of John Redcliffe-Maud . Hamish Hamilton. London 1981. ISBN 0-241-10569-2

Web links

• Maud, John Primatt Redcliffe, Baron Redcliffe Maud (1906-1982) on oxforddnb.com

Individual evidence

1. ↑ London Gazette v. June 11, 1942 Retrieved May 30, 2009
2. ↑ London Gazette v. June 4, 1946  ( 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. Retrieved May 30, 2009  
3. ↑ London Gazette v. December 31, 1954  ( 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. Retrieved May 30, 2009  
4. ^ Management of Local Government , Committee on the Management of Local Government, HMSO, 1967
5. ↑ Bruce Wood: The Process of Local Government Reform 1966-74 . George Allen & Unwin Ltd 1976. pp. 74-75.
6. ↑ London Gazette v. July 11, 1967 Retrieved May 30, 2009
7. ↑ Pictures by John Redcliffe-Maud on npg.org.uk
8. ↑ John Bridcut: Essential Britten: A Pocket Guide for the Britten Centenary. Faber & Faber, London 2012, ISBN 978-0-571-29074-1 , p. 1952 ( limited preview in Google book search).
9. ^ Archives of Redcliffe-Maud in the British Library of Political and Economic Science
10. ↑ Website of University College Oxford ( Memento of the original from January 16, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.