Basil Arthur

Sir Basil Malcolm Arthur, 5th Baronet Bt (18 September 1928 – 1 May 1985) served as Speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives from 1984 to 1985. He was a member of the Labour Party.

Early life

Sir Basil was born in Timaru, New Zealand. His father, a hotel proprietor, inherited the title of 4th Baronet in 1941 and it passed to Basil upon his death in 1949. Sir Basil, who showed a preference for labouring jobs, made little of his title.

Member of Parliament

In 1960 he stood for Labour in the Hamilton electorate, coming second.

In the 1962 by-election, he was elected to Parliament as the Labour MP for Timaru. On entering Parliament at age 33 he was the country's youngest MP.

Cabinet minister

He was Minister of Transport and Minister in Charge of the State Insurance Office from 1972 until 1975.

When Labour won the 1984 election, Sir Basil became Speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives.

Speaker

He served as Speaker for one year, before passing away in office after a short illness. The then Prime Minister, David Lange recalled in My Life (2005) that Sir Basil was gravely ill in Wellington Hospital, and if he resigned from the member's superannuation scheme before he died (but not otherwise) his estate would get a lump-sum payment. He had to answer a question in the house, then went to hospital with a letter of resignation "only to find that he had died hardly a minute before I got there". Labour lost the subsequent Timaru by-election, with a candidate that did not suit "the conservative character of the electorate."^[1]

It is interesting to note that Sir Basil is the second baronet to serve as Speaker. The first being Sir Charles Clifford, 1st Baronet (First Speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives), although he was made a baronet some time after he had retired from politics.

References

External links

• Dictionary of New Zealand Biography entry