Stanley Henig

Stanley Henig was born on 7 July 1939 in Leicester, the son of the politician and businessman Sir Mark Henig, Lord Mayor of Leicester and the first chairman of the English Tourist Board.[2] He was educated at Wyggeston Grammar School for Boys and Corpus Christi College, Oxford.[2]

An academic political scientist, he was one of the founders of the Department of Politics at Lancaster University in 1964. He later taught at the University of Warwick, the Civil Service College, and at the University of Central Lancashire where he was head of the Department of Politics and European Studies.

At the 1966 general election, Henig was returned to the House of Commons as Member of Parliament for Lancaster. However, he lost his seat at the 1970 general election to the Conservative Party candidate, Elaine Kellett-Bowman, and did not stand again. He entered local politics, and in the 1990s he was leader of Lancaster City Council.[3]

He was leader of the council at the time of the Blobbygate scandal and subsequently was deseated by the Greens at the 1999 council elections, although a later report by the district auditor cleared councillors of maladministration.

His former wife Ruth Henig, is a retired historian and was also a long-serving member of Lancashire County Council. She stood unsuccessfully as Labour candidate for Lancaster at the 1992 general election and became a life peer in 2004.

They married in 1966, but divorced in 1993, having had two sons, one of whom is the psephologist Simon Henig. In 2008, Simon followed in his father's footsteps by becoming Leader of the Labour-controlled Durham County Council, a role he held until 2021.[4]

• "Professor Stanley Henig appointed Deputy Pro-Chancellor". Lancaster University. 3 March 2006. Archived from the original on 26 May 2006. Retrieved 21 September 2006.
• Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Stanley Henig