 |
Bob Clay | |
|---|---|
| Member of Parliament for Sunderland North | |
| In office 1983–1992 | |
| Preceded by | Frederick Willey |
| Succeeded by | William Etheridge |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 2 October 1946 |
| Political party | Labour |
| Education | Gonville and Caius College,Cambridge |
Robert Alan Clay (born 2 October 1946), [1] known as Bob Clay,is a left-wing politician and former Labour MP in the United Kingdom.
Robert Clay was educated at Bedford School and Gonville and Caius College,Cambridge. Unusually for a man of his background,he went on to become a bus driver,working for Tyne and Wear PTE from 1975 to 1983. Clay first joined Labour as a teenager,but left to join the Trotskyist group International Socialists. He became a union shop steward in the 1980s and rejoined Labour.
Clay was first elected to Parliament in 1983 for the Sunderland North constituency,replacing Labour MP Frederick Willey. He was re-elected in 1987,but stood down at the 1992 general election;Labour's William Etherington was elected in his place.
Clay opposed the 2003 Iraq War. He backed the left-wing party RESPECT The Unity Coalition in the 2004 European Elections. At the 2005 general election,he acted as agent for Reg Keys,who stood against the Prime Minister Tony Blair in Blair's Sedgefield constituency on an anti-war ticket. [2] Keys' son Tom had been killed in action in Iraq. Although Clay was not an originator of Keys' campaign he used his position as agent to control all aspects of the campaign. He persuaded Derek Cattell,a former trade union officer and an executive member of Blair's Sedgefield Labour Party to join the campaign. Cattell's resignation from Labour during the election campaign,produced much publicity for the Keys campaign. Clay worked tirelessly for the Keys campaign helping build a coalition of support for Keys. Supporters included the former MP Martin Bell who in his book,The Truth that Sticks (2007) wrote "Of great value was Derek Cattell,formerly on the executive of Sedgefield Labour Party. He defected to Reg's campaign after some heart searching;it cost him some fair weather friends,but the candidate had no loyal supporter from start to finish." (page 103)
In 2015,the BBC announced that it was to produce a biographical drama film about Reg Keys' life called Reg . [3] In the film,broadcast on 6 June 2016,Clay was portrayed by Ralph Brown and the script was by Jimmy McGovern and Robert Pugh. [4]
Clay went on to live in the Marches city of Hereford,and remained politically active as a volunteer official in the local Labour Party. He involved himself in a number of local causes,including a group opposed to the building of a by-pass which would disturb ancient archaeological remains known as The Dinedor Serpent. He now lives in the Llansamlet ward of Swansea East,where,on 4 July 2013,he was elected in a by-election,as a Labour Party councillor for the City and County of Swansea Council. His wife,Uta Clay,served as a councillor for the same council,but both stood down at the 2017 election.
Martin Bell,is a British UNICEF Ambassador,a former broadcast war reporter and former independent politician who became the Member of Parliament (MP) for Tatton from 1997 to 2001. He is sometimes known as "the man in the white suit".
Ronald Davies is a retired Welsh politician,former Secretary of State for Wales,former Member of Parliament and former member of the Welsh Assembly. He describes himself as a politician belonging to the "traditional left" who had "spent his life looking for a socialist progressive party". He was a member of the Labour Party,and then of Forward Wales (2004-2009);he was subsequently an independent candidate and eventually joined Plaid Cymru in 2010.
Alan John Williams was a British Labour politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Swansea West for over 45 years,from 1964 to 2010. He was the longest serving MP for a Welsh constituency since David Lloyd George and built a reputation for his detailed scrutiny of the ways in which public money was spent.
Robert Nelson Wareing was a British politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Liverpool West Derby from 1983 to 2010. Until 2007,he was a Labour MP but resigned the party whip following his deselection as the party's candidate for his constituency.
The Respect Party was a left-wing to far-left,socialist political party active in the United Kingdom between 2004 and 2016. At the height of its success in 2007,the party had one Member of Parliament (MP) in the House of Commons and nineteen councillors in local government.
A by-election was held for the United Kingdom Parliament seat of Leicester South on 15 July 2004. It was triggered by the death of Labour Party Member of Parliament (MP) Jim Marshall,who died on 27 May 2004,shortly before the local and European elections in June. The by-election was won by Parmjit Singh Gill of the Liberal Democrats,over-turning a Labour majority of 13,243 votes at the 2001 general election.
Reginald Thomas Keys is the father of a British serviceman killed in the Iraq War. He stood in the 2005 general election as an anti-war independent candidate for in Sedgefield,a constituency represented by the then Prime Minister,Tony Blair.
Sedgefield is a constituency in County Durham represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2019 by Paul Howell of the Conservative Party. It elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election.
The 2005 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 5 May 2005,to elect 646 members to the House of Commons. The governing Labour Party,led by Tony Blair,won its third consecutive victory,with Blair becoming the second Labour leader after Harold Wilson to form three majority governments. However,its majority fell to 66 seats;the majority it won four years earlier had been of 167 seats. This was the first time the Labour Party had won a third consecutive election,and remains the party's most recent general election victory.
Peter John Law was a Welsh politician. For most of his career Law sat as a Labour councillor and subsequently Labour Co-operative Assembly member (AM) for Blaenau Gwent. Latterly he sat as an independent member of Parliament (MP) and AM for the same constituency.
David John Nellist is a British Trotskyist activist who was the MP for the constituency of Coventry South East from 1983 to 1992. Elected as a Labour MP,his support for the Militant tendency led to his eventual expulsion from the party in late 1991. He is the National Chair of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC),a member of the Socialist Party,and was a city councillor in Coventry from 1998 to 2012.
Leslie John Huckfield is a British Labour politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Nuneaton from 1967 to 1983 and as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from 1984 to 1989.
John Burton was a Labour Party councillor in County Durham,England. He was a member of Sedgefield Borough Council,representing the ward of Fishburn and Old Trimdon. He was the constituency agent of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair,who represented the Sedgefield constituency from 1983 until standing down as Prime Minister in 2007.
The 2007 Ealing Southall by-election was a by-election for the House of Commons constituency of Ealing Southall,in west London. It was held on 19 July 2007.
The 2007 Sedgefield by-election was a by-election held on 19 July 2007 for the House of Commons constituency of Sedgefield in County Durham. The Ealing Southall by-election was also held on 19 July.
Philip Wilson is a British Labour Party politician. He was elected as Member of Parliament (MP) for Sedgefield in a by-election that followed the resignation of Tony Blair,former Prime Minister,from the seat. He lost the seat at the 2019 general election to Paul Howell of the Conservative Party.
Reg is a one-off BBC Television fact-based drama about the campaign by Reg Keys to obtain answers following the death of his son Tom in the Iraq War,by standing in the 2005 general election as an anti-war independent candidate in Sedgefield,a constituency held by the then Prime Minister,Tony Blair.
On 20 October 2016,a by-election was held in the UK parliamentary constituency of Witney. It took place on the same day as the Batley and Spen by-election. They were the fifth and sixth by-elections of the 56th UK Parliament.
James Richard Frith is British politician who served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Bury North from 2017 to 2019. He is a member of the Labour Party.
