Everything about Timothy Beaumont Baron Beaumont Of Whitley totally explained
Timothy Wentworth Beaumont, Baron Beaumont of Whitley (
22 November 1928 –
8 April 2008) was an
Anglican clergyman and
United Kingdom politician. He was politically active in the
Liberal party, the
Liberal Democrats and the
Green Party. As a
life peer, when he joined the Greens in 1999, he became the only Green Party
parliamentarian.
Early and private life
Tim Beaumont's father, Major
Michael Beaumont, was a
Conservative MP for
Aylesbury, and his paternal grandfather,
Hubert Beaumont, was the
Radical MP for
Eastbourne from 1906 to 1910 and son of
Wentworth Beaumont, 1st Baron Allendale. His mother, Faith Pease, died when he was six. His maternal grandfather was
Liberal politician
Joseph Albert Pease, 1st Baron Gainford.
Beaumont was educated at
Eton College and
Gordonstoun School. He read agriculture at
Christ Church, Oxford, where he joined the
Bullingdon Club and founded the
Wagers Club. He graduated with a Fourth, and then trained for
holy orders at
Westcott House in
Cambridge. He was
ordained as a
deacon in 1955 and as a
priest in 1956. He married Mary Rose Wauchope (a cousin of
Antony Armstrong-Jones, 1st Earl of Snowdon) in 1955, with whom he'd had two sons and two daughters (Hubert Wentworth, Alaric Charles Blackett, Atalanta Armstrong, and Ariadne Grace Beaumont), and a total of ten grandchildren. His son, Alaric, died in a
road traffic accident in 1980. Also in that year, Hubert married
Katherine Abel Smith, a great-great-great-granddaughter of
Queen Victoria.
Church career
He became an Anglican priest in
Kowloon,
Hong Kong, serving as assistant chaplain at
St. John's Cathedral, Hong Kong from 1955-7 and then became Vicar of
Christ Church, Kowloon Tong until 1959. He received a substantial inheritance, he returned to England to live in
Mayfair and then
Hampstead. Meanwhile, he was an honorary curate
St Stephen's, Rochester Row from 1960-3. He represented the
Diocese of London in the
Church Assembly from 1960 to 1965. He became involved in church reform, supporting the
Parish and People movement, and was editor of the political weekly
Time and Tide and then the church reform magazine
Prism (later
New Christian, which merged with
American Christian Century). Considering his views and lifestyle incompatible with his position as a priest, he resigned his orders in 1973.
He returned to the cloth in 1984 and became priest-in-charge of St Philip and All Saints with St Luke,
Kew in the
Diocese of Southwark, retiring to Clapham in 1991.
Political career
After making a substantial donation to the Liberal party, he became its joint honorary treasurer in 1962-3. He was created a Liberal
Life peer as
Baron Beaumont of Whitley, of Child's Hill in
Greater London in 1967. He was chair of the Liberal Party in 1967-8 and President in 1969-70. In Parliament, he was Liberal spokesman on education and the arts until 1986. He also served as leader of the Liberals in the
Council of Europe. He was co-ordinator of the
Green Alliance from 1978 to 1980.
He joined the
Liberal Democrats, but, objecting to their support for
free trade, he moved the Green Party in 1999, and became the Green Party spokesman on agriculture.
In May 2006, Lord Beaumont put forth a
bill to "draw up a plan to prohibit piped music and the showing of television programmes in the public areas of hospitals and on public transport; and to require the wearing of headphones by persons listening to music in the public areas of hospitals and on public transport."
He strongly supported the Green Party system of having
Principal Speakers rather than a leader, saying that "in 60 years in politics I've only known one good party leader".
Other achievements
Beaumont was a patron of
transgender equality campaign group
Press for Change. He was chairman of the
Albany Trust from 1969-71, chairman of the
Institute of Research into Mental and Multiple Handicap from 1971-73, president of the
British Federation of Film Societies from 1973-79, and a member of the executive of
Church Action against Poverty. He was chairman of Exit (later the
Voluntary Euthanasia Society) in 1980. He edited
The Selective Ego, a shortened volume of the diaries of
James Agate, published in 1976, and a
Liberal Cookbook, published in 1972. He also wrote a food column for the
Illustrated London News from 1976-80, and wrote
The End of the Yellowbrick Road, published in 1997.
He died at
St Thomas' Hospital in London after being hospitalised for several weeks. He was survived by his wife, one of their two sons, and their two daughters.
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