| John Henry Hayes FRSA MP | |
|---|---|
| Minister of State for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning | |
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office 13 May 2010 |
|
| Preceded by | Kevin Brennan |
| Member of Parliament for South Holland and the Deepings |
|
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office 1 May 1997 |
|
| Preceded by | Constituency Created |
| Majority | 21,880 (43.6%) |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 23 June 1958 [1] Woolwich, London, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party | Conservative |
| Spouse(s) | Susan Hopewell [2] |
| Children | 2 sons [2] |
| Alma mater | University of Nottingham |
John Henry Hayes FRSA[3] (born 23 June 1958) is a British Conservative Party politician. He is the Member of Parliament (MP) for South Holland and The Deepings, and a member of the socially conservative Cornerstone Group. On 13 May 2010 he was appointed as Minister of State for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning jointly at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Department for Education.
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John Hayes was born in Woolwich, London and was educated at the Colfe's Grammar School in Lewisham and the University of Nottingham where he was awarded a BA degree in politics and a PGCE in history and English. He was chairman of the university Conservative Association; President of Lincoln Hall JCR and treasurer of the university's students' union from 1982-83.
Before entering Parliament, he was a sales director[4] of the Information Technology company, The Data Base Ltd Nottingham.
He was elected to Nottinghamshire County Council in 1985 where he was the Conservative Group Spokesman on Education and Chairman of its Campaigns Committee. He served there for 13 years, standing down following his election to parliament. He contested Derbyshire North East at the 1987 general election but was defeated by the new Labour MP Harry Barnes by 3,720 votes. He fought the same seat at the 1992 general election and although he increased the Tory vote, finished some 6,270 votes behind Barnes. He was elected to the House of Commons for the new Lincolnshire seat of South Holland and The Deepings at the 1997 general election. He secured a majority of 7,991 and has been elected with increased majorities at successive elections since with swings to him of 4.4% in 2001, 4.3% in 2005 and 0.3% in 2010, increasing the Conservative share of the vote to 59.1%, so making it one of the party's safest seats. He made his maiden speech on 2 July 1997.
In parliament he served on the agriculture, fisheries and food select committee for two years from 1997 and two years on the education and employment committee from 1998. In 1999 he was appointed as a vice chairman of the Conservative Party with responsibility for campaigning by William Hague, and in 2000 continued on the frontbench as Shadow Schools Minister in the education and skills. He was appointed Assistant Chief Whip Opposition Whip by Iain Duncan Smith - for whom Hayes was a speech writer - in 2001, before entering his shadow cabinet as the shadow Agriculture & Fisheries Secretary in 2002. In 2003, after a change of leader, Michael Howard appointed him to be Shadow Minister for Housing & Planning. He was briefly a spokesman on transport following the 2005 general election before being moved by David Cameron later in 2005 to again speak on education and skills and in particular on vocational education. He was promoted by Cameron to Shadow Minster for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education in 2007. He has served as the chairman of the All Party Group on disability and secretary of the All Party Group on brain injury. At the end of 2008 he won the ePolitix/House Magazine Disability Charity Champion Award. Since 2009 he has been Honorary Chairman of the British Caribbean Association.
On 16 May 2011 the ePolitix website discovered that Mr Hayes had copied much of his speech on bank holidays from a Wikipedia article[5].