Edward Fletcher (politician)

Edward (Ted) Joseph Fletcher (25 February 1911 – 13 February 1983) was a British Labour Party politician.

Fletcher was educated at Fircroft College, Birmingham and was a trade union official. He served as a councillor on Newcastle City Council from 1952 and chaired the North-Eastern Association for the Arts.

Fletcher unsuccessfully contested Middlesbrough West at the 1959 general election. In the 1964 general election, he was elected as Member of Parliament (MP) for Darlington, and held the seat until his death in 1983, aged 71. He was a member of the Tribune Group and was regarded as being broadly on the left of the Labour Party.

Fletcher's Labour successor in the resulting by-election was Oswald O'Brien, who was MP for just a matter of weeks before he lost to the Conservative Michael Fallon in the 1983 general election.

Ted Fletcher Court remains in the Haughton area of Darlington, as a memorial to Fletcher.