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Chris Huhne

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-->Christopher Murray Paul Huhne (born 2 July 1954) is a British Liberal Democrat politician and the current Member of Parliament for the Eastleigh constituency in Hampshire. He finished second to Menzies Campbell in the 2006 election for the leadership of the Liberal Democrats and is the party's Shadow Secretary for Environment and Rural Affairs in the House of Commons.

Career before Parliament

He was educated at Westminster School, the Sorbonne and Magdalen College, Oxford where he served on the Executive of the Oxford University Labour Club, and achieved a first-class degree in PPE (Philosophy, Politics and Economics).

Before his political career, he was a City economist, and before that an economic commentator for The Guardian, The Independent and The Independent on Sunday. He also worked as a journalist for the Liverpool Daily Post and Echo and The Economist.

Huhne contested the 1983 general election as a Parliamentary Candidate for the SDP-Liberal Alliance. He stood as the SDP candidate in Reading West. In the 1987 general election, he was the SDP candidate in the Oxford West and Abingdon seat later won for the Liberal Democrats by Evan Harris.

Huhne was elected as a member of the European Parliament for South East England from 1999 to 2004, where he was deputy leader of the Liberal Democrat group in the European Parliament. While coming third in the regional poll of party members to select candidates for the 1999 Euro election, Huhne came a comfortable first in the selection for the 2004 Euro elections.

During his time in the European Parliament, Huhne was a member of the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee, concerned with economic and financial policy including regulation of the financial sector. He was economic spokesman for the pan-European Liberal group in the European Parliament and was resposible for introducing "sunset clauses" – time limits on powers – into European legislation for the first time; for radically amending Commission proposals on financial services; and for opening up the European Central Bank to greater scrutiny.

In addition to his European Parliament responsibilities, he was also active in the development of Liberal Democrat policy as chairman of four policy groups: broadcasting and the media; globalisation; the introduction of the euro and the reform of public services.

Huhne is married to Vicky Pryce, Chief Economist at the DTI, and they have five children, three of whom are now grown up.

Huhne is a member of the UK Metric Association, a pressure group which argues for the full implementation of the metrication programme in the UK.[link] He is a member of the Peel Group but has also contributed articles to the Beveridge Group. He has also written four books that are mainly on the themes either of third world debt and development or European integration: the latest is entitled Both Sides of the Coin (1999, with James Forder), in which he argues the case for British membership of the Euro. He is also one of the contributors to The Orange Book (2004), in which he advocates reforms to the United Nations and international governance. More recently, he contributed to the book The City in Europe and the World (2005).

Member of Parliament

He was first elected to represent Eastleigh at the general election on 5 May 2005, a constituency within the area for which he was previously the Member of the European Parliament. The previous MP for the constituency, David Chidgey, was also a Liberal Democrat who won his seat in what was historically a Conservative area in a by-election in 1994 following the accidental death of Stephen Milligan. The result in 2005 was close, with the swing away from the Liberal Democrats being half the average swing away when a Liberal Democrat MP stands down.

Charles Kennedy appointed Huhne a Treasury spokesman for his party, as shadow chief secretary. Huhne led the opposition in the Commons to new rules allowing full top rate tax relief for the purchase of second homes, buy-to-let properties, vintage wine and other exotic assets for self invested pension plans, tabling an amendment to the finance bill in June, and repeatedly raising the issue. The Treasury reversed its position and accepted these points in the October pre-budget report.

Following Charles Kennedy's resignation as party leader, Huhne stood in the election to replace him. He formally launched his campaign on 13 January 2006 as the fourth candidate to succeed Kennedy, following Sir Menzies Campbell, Mark Oaten (who subsequently withdrew) and Simon Hughes. He came second to Campbell, who appointed him environment spokesman in the subsequent reshuffle.[link]

External links

 

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