Ernest Armstrong (12 January 1915 – 8 July 1996) was a British Labour Party politician. Armstrong was educated at

Wolsingham Grammar School Wolsingham is a market town in Weardale, County Durham, England. It is situated by the River Wear, between Crook and Stanhope. History Wolsingham sits at the confluence of the River Wear and Waskerley Beck. It is a small settlement and one ...

and City of Leeds Teacher Training College, and ultimately became a headmaster. He served as a councillor on Sunderland Borough Council and chaired its education committee. Defeated by the Conservative incumbent in Sunderland South in the 1955 and

1959 Events January * January 1 - Cuba: Fulgencio Batista flees Havana when the forces of Fidel Castro advance. * January 2 - Lunar probe Luna 1 was the first man-made object to attain escape velocity from Earth. It reached the vicinity of E ...

General Elections, Armstrong was

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

(MP) for

North West Durham North West Durham is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 12 December 2019 by Richard Holden of the Conservative Party. Constituency profile The constituency is in the north west of County Durham ...

from

1964 Events January * January 1 – The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland is dissolved. * January 5 - In the first meeting between leaders of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches since the fifteenth century, Pope Paul VI and Patriarc ...

until his retirement in

1987 File:1987 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The MS Herald of Free Enterprise capsizes after leaving the Port of Zeebrugge in Belgium, killing 193; Northwest Airlines Flight 255 crashes after takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airport, ...

. His daughter,

Hilary Armstrong Hilary Jane Armstrong, Baroness Armstrong of Hill Top, DL (born 30 November 1945) is a British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for North West Durham from 1987 to 2010. Early life Armstrong was born on 30 Nove ...

, was his successor. Armstrong served as a parliamentary private secretary (PPS) from 1965, and a Labour whip, and junior minister for Education and Science (1974–1975) and the Environment (1975–1979). Armstrong was a

Methodist local preacher A Methodist local preacher, also known as a licensed preacher, is a layperson who has been accredited by the Methodist Church to lead worship and preach on a frequent basis. With separation from the Church of England by the end of the 18th century ...

and served as vice-president of the

Methodist Conference The Methodist Church of Great Britain is a Protestant Christian denomination in Britain, and the mother church to Methodists worldwide. It participates in the World Methodist Council, and the World Council of Churches among other ecumenical ass ...

in 1974. After Labour lost the 1979 general election, he served as a Deputy Speaker. After his retirement, Armstrong acted as political adviser to the BBC's production of the political drama ''

House of Cards A house of cards (also known as a card tower or card castle) is a structure created by stacking playing cards on top of each other, often in the shape of a pyramid. "House of cards" is also an expression that dates back to 1645 meaning a structu ...

''.

References

* ''The Times Guide to the House of Commons'',

Times Newspapers Ltd News Corp UK & Ireland Limited (trading as News UK, formerly News International and NI Group) is a British newspaper publisher, and a wholly owned subsidiary of the American mass media conglomerate News Corp. It is the current publisher o ...

, 1987 * ''Whitaker's Almanack 1997''

External links

* 1915 births 1996 deaths Councillors in Tyne and Wear Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom Methodist local preachers Ministers in the Wilson governments, 1964–1970 UK MPs 1964–1966 UK MPs 1966–1970 UK MPs 1970–1974 UK MPs 1974 UK MPs 1974–1979 UK MPs 1979–1983 UK MPs 1983–1987 {{England-Labour-UK-MP-stub