Tom Williams, Baron Williams of Barnburgh

Thomas Williams, Baron Williams of Barnburgh, PC (18 March 1888 – 29 March 1967[1]) was a British coal miner who became a Labour Party politician.[2]

Lord Williams

Career

Born in Blackwell, Derbyshire,[3] Williams grew up in Swinton in Yorkshire, and began work in 1899 in Kilnhurst colliery.[3] He became involved in trade unionism and joined the Independent Labour Party, switching briefly to the British Socialist Party during World War I before joining the Labour Party. In 1918, he was elected as a Labour member of the Bolton-upon-Dearne Urban District Council.

He was elected at the 1922 general election as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Don Valley,[1][4][5] and held the seat until he stepped down at the 1959 general election.[6]

In Parliament

In the First Labour Government, from January to October 1924, Williams was Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Noel Buxton, the Minister of Agriculture.[2] In the Second Labour Government from 1929 to 1931, he was PPS to the Minister of Labour, Margaret Bondfield.[2]

Williams first held ministerial office in Winston Churchill's wartime Coalition Government, when he was Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries from 1940 to 1945,[2] serving under the Conservative minister Robert Hudson.[3] He was made a Privy Counsellor in August 1941.[7] In Clement Attlee's post-war Labour government, he was Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food from 1945 to 1951,[2] and after Labour lost the 1951 general election he was the opposition spokesperson on Agriculture until 1959.[2]

After his retirement from the House of Commons in 1959, he was created a life peer on 2 February 1961 taking the title Baron Williams of Barnburgh, of Barnburgh in the West Riding of the County of York.[8][9]

His autobiography, in which he gives an account of his life since childhood, was published in 1965 with a foreword by Clement Attlee.[10]

References

1. Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "D" (part 2)
2. Stenton, Michael; Lees, Stephens (1981). Who's Who of British Members of Parliament: Volume IV, 1945–1979. Brighton: The Harvester Press. p. 400. ISBN 0-85527-335-6.
3. Taylor, Andrew (September 2004; online edn, October 2009). "Williams, Thomas, Baron Williams of Barnburgh (1888–1967)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/36930. Retrieved 8 August 2010. Check date values in: |date= (help) (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)(subscription required)
4. Craig, F. W. S. (1983) [1969]. British parliamentary election results 1918–1949 (3rd ed.). Chichester: Parliamentary Research Services. p. 514. ISBN 0-900178-06-X.
5. "No. 32775". The London Gazette. 8 December 1922. p. 8712.
6. "62 M.P.S Not To Stand Again For Election: Four Not Readopted". The Times. 30 July 1959. p. 4.
7. "Privy Counsellors 1915–1968". Leigh Rayment's peerage pages. Retrieved 8 August 2010.
8. "No. 42231". The London Gazette (Supplement). 27 December 1960. p. 8889.
9. "No. 42272". The London Gazette. 7 February 1961. p. 933.
10. Williams, Thomas (1965). Digging for Britain. The Autobiography of Lord Williams of Barnburgh. London: Hutchinsons of London.

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Tom Williams
• Portraits of Thomas ('Tom') Williams, Baron Williams of Barnburgh at the National Portrait Gallery, London