Chris Davies (Liberal Democrat politician)

Chris Davies
Member of the European Parliament for North West England
In office 10 June 1999 – 2 July 2014
Preceded by	Position established
Succeeded by	Julie Ward
Member of Parliament for Littleborough and Saddleworth
In office 27 July 1995 – 1 May 1997
Preceded by	Geoffrey Dickens
Succeeded by	Position abolished
Personal details
Born	(1954-07-07) 7 July 1954 Lytham St Annes, Lancashire
Nationality	British
Political party	Liberal Democrat
Residence	Greenfield, Greater Manchester
Alma mater	Cheadle Hulme School Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge

Christopher Graham Davies (born 7 July 1954) is a Liberal Democrat politician in the United Kingdom. He is a former Member of Parliament, and from 1999 until 2014 he was a Member of the European Parliament.

Biography

Davies was born in Lytham St Annes, Lancashire. His father was a doctor, and his mother a nurse. He was educated at the independent Cheadle Hulme School (1965–72), at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge (1972–75, reading history) and from 1975 to 1977 at the University of Kent, Canterbury.

Davies is a resident of Greenfield, in Saddleworth, Greater Manchester.^[1][2]

Political career

Local Government

Davies was a Liberal member of Liverpool City Council from 1980 to 1984, representing Abercromby ward and serving as Chairman of the Housing Committee. From 1994 to 1998 he was a Liberal Democrat councillor for Lees ward on Oldham Metropolitan Borough Council.

Houses of Parliament/Westminster

Davies contested Liverpool Scotland Exchange in 1979, and then Littleborough and Saddleworth in 1987 and 1992. He became the MP for that seat after a by-election in 1995, during which time Labour campaign manager Peter Mandelson branded him “...high on taxes and soft on drugs” for supporting Liberal Democrat policy on increasing income tax by 1p in the pound to provide additional funding for education, and to establish a Royal Commission to consider decriminalisation of cannabis.^[3]

The Littleborough and Saddleworth seat was abolished by the time of the 1997 General Election. Davies contested Oldham East and Saddleworth at the 1997 election but lost to Phil Woolas of Labour.^[4]

European Parliament

Davies was elected as a Member of the European Parliament for the North West England constituency in 1999 and served as the Liberal Democrat spokesman on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety Committee (ENVI) in the European Parliament. In March 2014 he won a parliamentarian of the year award for his work to promote sustainable fishing through Fish for the Future, an all-party group he created in 2010.^[5] His efforts included dressing as a fish in the European Parliament to raise awareness of the need for reform of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP).^[6] He lost his seat in the 2014 European election.

During his time as an MEP, Davies was active in the environment, climate and energy policy sectors, and served as the ALDE coordinator (team leader) on the ENVI committee from 2007.^[7] He was the rapporteur for the Geological Storage of Carbon Dioxide (Carbon Capture and Storage, CCS) Directive in 2008-9^[8] and for the implementation report on CCS in 2013-14,^[9] which called for greater action to develop and deploy CCS in the EU. In 2008 he drafted and amendment^[10] that led to the creation of a funding mechanism for CCS and innovative renewable energy projects that became known as NER300, later described by the European Commission as one the world’s largest funding programmes for innovative low-carbon energy demonstration projects.^[11]

Controversies

Due to controversy over the tone of a series of emails he exchanged with a pro-Israeli constituent, Davies was forced to resign as leader of the Liberal Democrats group in the European Parliament.^[12] Davies served as the Liberal Democrat spokesman on the environment and public health in the European Parliament.

In 2008, Davies made some widely publicised comments on an unpublished report which, he claimed, contained evidence of "embezzlement and fraud" among EU parliament members.^[13]

At the autumn 2009 Liberal Democrat conference in Bournemouth, Davies made a speech in a debate about the MP expenses scandal, where he appeared to become very angry, exclaiming "I hate, I hate the dirty cheating bastards who have taken every opportunity to fill their private pockets with public money.. .. they should play no part in public life". He went on the implore his Liberal Democrat colleagues to "Publish everything, reveal all, hide nothing."^[14]

In December 2009 Davies appeared on The Politics Show North West alongside Nick Griffin on a debate regarding climate change and the then forthcoming 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, which both men were attending as part of the EU Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety.^[15]

References

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Chris Davies
• full text of the email exchange that led to Davies's resignation
• Chris Davies MEP official site
• Chris Davies profile at the European Parliament
• Chris Davies profile at the site of the Liberal Democrats
• Lib Dem quits in row over remarks
• 2014 MEP Award for the Environment