Michael Spicer

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sir Michael William Hardy Spicer (born January 22, 1943) is the British Member of Parliament for West Worcestershire. He is a Conservative backbencher, and chairman of the 1922 committee.

Born in Bath, Spicer was educated at Wellington College and has a degree in economics from Emmanuel College, Cambridge. After graduation, he worked as a financial journalist for the Daily Mail, the Sunday Times and The Statist.

At the 1966 general election, he challenged Manny Shinwell in the safe Labour Easington constituency as the youngest Parliamentary candidate in the country against the oldest. He stood in Easington again at the 1970 general election before being elected at the February 1974 general election for South Worcestershire. He represented South Worcestershire until 1997 when boundary changes abolished the constituency and he moved to the West Worcestershire seat which he has represented since.

After the 1979 general election, which swept the Conservatives to power, he became Parliamentary Private Secretary at the Department of Trade. He was later made a Deputy Chairman of the Conservative Party. He became a Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department of Transport in 1984, serving until 1987, with specific responsibility for Aviation. In 1987, he moved to the Department of Energy, again as a Parliament Under Secretary, this time with responsibility for Electricity and Coal. In January 1990, he was promoted to become a Minister of State at the Department of Environment, however, after the ousting of Margaret Thatcher in November 1990, he left the government payroll.

On leaving the government he became Chairman of the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee in the House of Commons. In 1996, he was knighted. In the wake of the 1997 general election, he became a member of the Treasury Select Committee.

[edit] As an MP since 1997

After the 2001 general election he was elected Chairman of the 1922 committee, a position he has served in since.

As chairman of the 1922 committee, he has the distinction of having presided over more leadership elections than any of his predecessors as Iain Duncan Smith, Michael Howard and David Cameron have all been elected in his tenure.

His majority was sliced in 1997, just like the general trend across the country but almost doubled it 4 years later at the 2001 General Election. However, unlike most Conservative MP's he failed to increase his majority instead it was more than halved. If the same swing that occurred in 2005 in the seat happened again at the next General Election the seat would we won by the Liberal-Democrats

Spicer has since announced that he will not contest the Worcestershire West seat at the next General election and would retire as an MP.

[edit] External links

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Gerald Nabarro	Member of Parliament for Worcestershire South 1974–1997	Succeeded by constituency abolished
Preceded by new constituency	Member of Parliament for Worcestershire West 1997 – present	Incumbent
Political offices
Preceded by Archie Hamilton	Chair of the 1922 Committee 2001 – present	Incumbent