Lord David Alton
The Rt. Hon Prof. the Lord Alton of Liverpool KCMCO KCSG
On March 29th 1979 David recorded what was then the biggest ever
political swing becoming the both the youngest MP of the Parliament
and the shortest lived. Elected the day after the Callaghan
Government lost the Vote of Confidence, he served for two days
before returning to Liverpool to fight the subsequent General
Election.
He successfully held Edge Hill and then Mossley Hill in the General
Elections of 1979, 1983, 1987 and 1992. He stood down in 1997 after
disagreeing with the Lib Dem decision to make support for abortion a
party policy rather than a question of conscience. In 1997 John
Major recommended his appointment to the House of Lords where he has
served as an Independent Crossbench Peer.
Having been elected as the UK’s youngest City Councillor while still
a student in 1972, David became Deputy Leader and Housing Chairman
of Liverpool Council. Until his election to Parliament he was
a teacher.
Throughout the 1980s he held a series of parliamentary portfolios –
including Home Affairs, Environment and Northern Ireland. He served
as his Party’s Chief Whip and was President of the National League
of Young Liberals.
With Danny Smith he launched the human rights group, Jubilee
Campaign, which led to campaigns, visits and reports on the plight
of Jewish and Christian dissidents in the former Soviet Union and
Eastern Europe.
In 1987 he published “What Kind of Country?” – the first of ten
books and introduced a Private Member’s Bill to lower the upper time
limit for abortions. The Bill received 296 votes and a majority of
45 and never lost a vote but was later talked out by opponents.
In 1988 he married Lizzie Bell – and Marianne was born the following
year, followed by Padraig, Philip and James.
Throughout the 1990s, and subsequently, he has continued his
campaigns for human rights and the sanctity of human life.
This work has taken him illegally into Burma, to North Korea,
the favelas of Brazil, the Middle East, the Congo, Rwanda, Southern
Sudan, Darfur and other areas of conflict. In Parliament he is
Chairman of the All Party Group on North Korea, Secretary of the APG
on Sudan and Vice Chairman of the APG on Tibet. He is
Treasurer of the Parliamentary friends of CAFOD. He has been a
vociferous opponent of human cloning, animal-human hybrid
embryos, and the legalisation of euthanasia.
In 1996 David became a Visiting Fellow of St Andrew’s University; in
1997 he was appointed Professor of Citizenship at Liverpool John
Moores University, where he established the Foundation for
Citizenship and the Roscoe Lecture series. He is a Foundation
Governor of the Liverpool Bluecoat School and a Governor of
Stonyhurst College. Among the international awards he has received
are the Michael Bell Memorial Award for Initiatives for Life, the
Mystery of Life Award, and the Advocates International award for
human rights work.
David Alton is a patron, trustee, President or Vice President of
the following organisations:
Crisis (charity for the homeless)
Karen Aid
Habitat for Humanity
Mersey Kidney Research
LIFE
Jospice (St.Joseph's Hospice, Merseyside.)
Right To Life
Zoe's Place, Liverpool.
Alert
Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine
Deaf Way
Turkana New Ways Appeal (Kenya)
Network of Child Contact and Access Centres
International Young Leaders Network
G.K.Chesterton Institute
Motec Life (Ghana)
Asylum Link Merseyside
The Bible Society
Building Bridges
Local Solutions
Stephen's Children (Cairo)
Francis House, Manchester.
Friends of St.Mary Abbot's
Co-founder of Jubilee Campaign in Parliament and the Epiphany Trust