Life In Brief
DOUG HOYLE LABOUR MP AND FATHER OF COMMONS SPEAKER
Lord Doug Hoyle, a backbench
Labour MP for over 20 years, former chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party and father of Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle, has died aged 98. Doug Hoyle was an MP for
Nelson and Colne, a now-abolished constituency in Lancashire, from 1974 to 1979, and for Warrington North from 1981 to 1997. He stepped down from Parliament at the 1997 election, the same year his son Sir Lindsay was first elected MP for Chorley. That year, Lord Hoyle was made Baron Hoyle of Warrington in the County of Cheshire. He retired from the Lords in July 2023. Eric Douglas Harvey was born in 1926 in the village of Coppull in Lancashire, to mother Leah, a housewife, and father William, a shop assistant. Lord Hoyle joined the Labour Party in 1945 as Clement Attlee swept to power, and first stood
for Parliament in the old Clitheroe constituency in Lancashire in 1964, finishing second in that year’s election. He lost to the Conservative candidate in the 1970 election when standing in Nelson and Colne, contesting that seat again in February 1974 and reducing the Tory majority, before winning it in the year’s second election, in October. After losing his seat in 1979, Lord Hoyle returned to Parliament in 1981 with a by-election win in Warrington North.
Before entering Parliament, Lord Hoyle was an engineering apprentice for British Rail in Horwich, becoming a sales engineer in Manchester and then a marketing executive until the start of his career in Westminister. In 1957, Lord Hoyle helped found Labour Friends of Israel. He was president of the Association of Scientific Technological and
Managerial Staffs, a powerful whitecollar union, as well as its successor, the Manufacturing, Science and Finance Union, in two stints: from
1977 to 1981 and then 1985 to 1988. Though he never held ministerial office, Lord Hoyle was an influential backbencher. He served as chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party from 1992 to 1997 and was also a member of the party’s National Executive Committee. Despite having solid leftwing credentials through his trade union work, Lord Hoyle worked for a succession of party leaders. He was opposed to Britain’s involvement in Europe, and spoke on the subject in the House of Commons in 1974. He also believed in House of Lords reform, and it is thought that his son Lindsay had to persuade him to move to the red benches in 1997 upon his retirement as an MP. Lord Hoyle became a government whip in the Lords during Tony Blair’s first administration. As well as serving as chairman of Warrington Wolves rugby league club from 1999 to 2009, Lord Hoyle was also a non-executive director of Debt Free Direct, a major local employer.
In 1953 he married Pauline Spencer, who died in 1991. He is survived by their son, Lindsay, who was born in 1957.
Born 17 February 1926 Died 6 April 2024 Veronica Lee