Tom Williams, Baron Williams of Barnburgh

Thomas Williams, Baron Williams of Barnburgh, PC (18 March 1888 – 29 March 1967[1]) was a British coal miner who became a Labour Party politician.[2]

Not to be confused with Thomas Williams, 1st Baron Williams or Thomas Williams (Warrington MP).
For other people named Tom Williams, see Tom Williams (disambiguation).

Lord Williams

Career

Born in Blackwell, Derbyshire,[3] Williams grew up in Swinton in Yorkshire, and began work in 1899 in Kilnhurst colliery.[3] He became involved in trade unionism and joined the Independent Labour Party, switching briefly to the British Socialist Party during World War I before joining the Labour Party. In 1918, he was elected as a Labour member of the Bolton-upon-Dearne Urban District Council.

He was elected at the 1922 general election as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Don Valley,[1][4][5] and held the seat until he stepped down at the 1959 general election.[6]

In Parliament

In the First Labour Government, from January to October 1924, Williams was Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Noel Buxton, the Minister of Agriculture.[2] In the Second Labour Government from 1929 to 1931, he was PPS to the Minister of Labour, Margaret Bondfield.[2]

Williams first held ministerial office in Winston Churchill's wartime Coalition Government, when he was Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries from 1940 to 1945,[2] serving under the Conservative minister Robert Hudson.[3] He was made a Privy Counsellor in August 1941.[7] In Clement Attlee's post-war Labour government, he was Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food from 1945 to 1951,[2] most notably steering the Agriculture Act of 1947 through the House of Commons.[8] After Labour lost the 1951 general election he was the opposition spokesperson on Agriculture until 1959.[2]

After his retirement from the House of Commons in 1959, he was created a life peer on 2 February 1961 taking the title Baron Williams of Barnburgh, of Barnburgh in the West Riding of the County of York.[9][10]

His autobiography, in which he gives an account of his life since childhood, was published in 1965 with a foreword by Clement Attlee.[11]

References
  1. Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "D" (part 2)
  2. Stenton, Michael; Lees, Stephens (1981). Who's Who of British Members of Parliament: Volume IV, 1945–1979. Brighton: The Harvester Press. p. 400. ISBN 0-85527-335-6.
  3. Taylor, Andrew (October 2009) [September 2004]. "Williams, Thomas, Baron Williams of Barnburgh (1888–1967)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/36930. Retrieved 8 August 2010. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)(subscription required)
  4. Craig, F. W. S. (1983) [1969]. British parliamentary election results 1918–1949 (3rd ed.). Chichester: Parliamentary Research Services. p. 514. ISBN 0-900178-06-X.
  5. "No. 32775". The London Gazette. 8 December 1922. p. 8712.
  6. "62 M.P.S Not To Stand Again For Election: Four Not Readopted". The Times. 30 July 1959. p. 4.
  7. "Privy Counsellors 1915–1968". Leigh Rayment's peerage pages. Archived from the original on 7 June 2008. Retrieved 8 August 2010.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  8. Hennessy, Peter (1989). Whitehall. London: Secker & Warburg. p. 443. ISBN 978-0-436-19271-5.
  9. "No. 42231". The London Gazette (Supplement). 27 December 1960. p. 8889.
  10. "No. 42272". The London Gazette. 7 February 1961. p. 933.
  11. Williams, Thomas (1965). Digging for Britain. The Autobiography of Lord Williams of Barnburgh. London: Hutchinsons of London.
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