Christopher Mayhew

Christopher Paget Mayhew, Baron Mayhew (12 June 1915 – 7 January 1997) was a British politician who was a Labour Member of Parliament (MP) from 1945 to 1950 and from 1951 to 1974, when he left the Labour Party to become a Liberal. In 1981 Mayhew received a life peerage and was raised to the House of Lords as Baron Mayhew.

Christopher Paget Mayhew was the son of Sir Basil Mayhew of Felthorpe Hall, Norwich.

Mayhew attended Haileybury and Christ Church, Oxford, as an exhibitioner. In 1934 he holidayed in Moscow. While he was at Oxford, he became President of the Oxford Union. He was commissioned into the Intelligence Corps in 1940, rising to the rank of Major.

Mayhew was elected to Parliament for the constituency of South Norfolk in the general election of 1945.

In 1945 Mayhew became Under-Secretary of State at the Foreign Office, where he served under Ernest Bevin and acquired strongly pro-Arab views.

Mayhew lost his seat in 1950, but soon returned to Parliament after the death of Bevin, when he won the by-election in 1951 for Bevin's seat of Woolwich East.

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