Sir Alan Beith
|
The Right Honourable The Lord Beith PC |
|
|---|---|
Official portrait of Lord Beith
|
|
| Chairman of the Liaison Committee | |
|
In office 21 July 2010 – 30 March 2015 |
|
| Preceded by | Alan Williams |
| Succeeded by | Andrew Tyrie |
| Lib Dem Shadow Leader of the Commons | |
|
In office 29 August 1999 – 15 May 2003 |
|
| Leader | Charles Kennedy |
| Preceded by | Charles Kennedy |
| Succeeded by | Paul Tyler |
| Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrats | |
|
In office 11 April 1992 – 12 February 2003 |
|
| Leader |
Paddy Ashdown Charles Kennedy |
| Preceded by | Russell Johnston |
| Succeeded by | Menzies Campbell |
| Liberal Democrat Home Affairs Spokesman | |
|
In office 12 July 1994 – 29 August 1999 |
|
| Leader | Charles Kennedy |
| Preceded by | Position established |
| Succeeded by | Simon Hughes |
| Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party | |
|
In office 1985 – 16 July 1988 |
|
| Leader | David Steel |
| Preceded by | John Pardoe (From 1979) |
| Succeeded by | Russell Johnston (Lib Dems) |
| Liberal Chief Whip in the Commons | |
|
In office 1977–1985 |
|
| Leader | David Steel |
| Preceded by | Cyril Smith |
| Succeeded by | David Alton |
|
Member of Parliament for Berwick-upon-Tweed |
|
|
In office 8 November 1973 – 30 March 2015 |
|
| Preceded by | Antony Lambton |
| Succeeded by | Anne-Marie Trevelyan |
|
Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal |
|
|
Assumed office 19 October 2015 Life Peerage |
|
| Personal details | |
| Born |
20 April 1943 Poynton, Cheshire |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party |
Liberal (Before 1988) Liberal Democrats (1988–present) |
| Spouse(s) |
Barbara Ward (m. 1965–1998) Diana, Baroness Maddock (m. 2001) |
| Children | 2 |
| Alma mater |
Balliol College, Oxford Nuffield College, Oxford |
| Website | Official website |
Alan James Beith, Baron Beith, PC (born 20 April 1943) is a British politician who represented Berwick-upon-Tweed as its Member of Parliament (MP) from 1973 to 2015.
From 1992 to 2003, he was Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrats and, by 2015, Beith was the longest-serving member of his party sitting in the House of Commons and the last Liberal Democrat MP to have experience of Parliament in the 1970s.
Beith was elevated as a Life Peer in the 2015 Dissolution Honours List and took his title and a seat on the House of Lords Opposition benches on 23 November 2015.
The son of John Beith, of Scottish extraction, he was born in 1943 at Poynton in Cheshire. He was educated at The King's School, Macclesfield before going to Balliol College, Oxford, where he read Philosophy, Politics and Economics graduating in 1964. He then pursued postgraduate studies at Nuffield College receiving a Bachelor of Letters (BLitt) degree.
In 1966, Beith began his career as a politics lecturer in the University of Newcastle. In 1969 he was elected as a Councillor on Hexham District Council and, in 1970, he was also elected to Corbridge Town Council. He contested Berwick-upon-Tweed as the Liberal's candidate at the 1970 general election but was heavily defeated by the sitting Conservative MP Antony Lambton.
...
Wikipedia