David Porter (British politician)

David John Porter^[1] (born 16 April 1948), was Conservative Member of Parliament for Waveney from 1987 to 1997.

Before going into parliament he was a drama teacher at Kirkley High School. After the 1997 election, he concentrated his efforts on supporting the British film industry. During his time in office, he never managed to completely step out of the shadow of his predecessor, the Conservative Minister from Lowestoft, Jim Prior.

Porter had an in-depth knowledge of the fishing industry, and was considered to be a single-issue politician and a rebel. On several occasions he was threatened with suspension, and once actually suspended, from the Conservative party over the government's fishing policy, which Porter argued would result in overfishing and deplete fish stocks, damaging the fishing industry in the longer term. Although the Conservative party tried to select a different candidate, at the time the local Conservative Associations had total power of selection and retained Porter. He regularly campaigned for Britain to leave the European Common Fisheries Policy, preferring a system of local control with a yearly 'Sabbath' (ban of fishing) rotating through each sea area around the United Kingdom waters.

Although he always remained popular locally, he lost his seat in the Labour landslide to Bob Blizzard, a local councillor.

References

• The Times Guide to the House of Commons, Times Newspapers Ltd, 1997
• Leigh Rayment's Peerage Pages