George Henry Roberts (27 July 1868 – 25 April 1928) was a Labour Party politician who switched parties twice.

Biography

He was born on 27 July 1868. At the 1906 general election, he was elected as

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 of ...

(MP) for

Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. Norwich is by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. As the seat of the See of Norwich, with ...

. He was a minister in the

Lloyd George David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, (17 January 1863 – 26 March 1945) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916 to 1922. He was a Liberal Party (United Kingdom), Liberal Party politician from Wales, known for lea ...

Coalition Government A coalition government is a form of government in which political parties cooperate to form a government. The usual reason for such an arrangement is that no single party has achieved an absolute majority after an election, an atypical outcome in ...

Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade in the United Kingdom was a member of Parliament assigned to assist the Board of Trade and its President with administration and liaison with Parliament. It replaced the Vice-President of the Board o ...

from 1916 to 1917,

Minister of Labour Minister of Labour (in British English) or Labor (in American English) is typically a cabinet-level position with portfolio responsibility for setting national labour standards, labour dispute mechanisms, employment, workforce participation, traini ...

from 1917 to 1919, and

Minister of Food Control The Minister of Food Control (1916–1921) and the Minister of Food (1939–1958) were British government ministerial posts separated from that of the Minister of Agriculture. In the Great War the Ministry sponsored a network of canteens known as ...

from 1919 to 1920. He was appointed as a

Privy Counsellor The Privy Council (PC), officially His Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, is a privy council, formal body of advisers to the British monarchy, sovereign of the United Kingdom. Its membership mainly comprises Politics of the United King ...

in 1917. Roberts stood in

1918 This year is noted for the end of the First World War, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, as well as for the Spanish flu pandemic that killed 50–100 million people worldwide. Events Below, the events ...

as a

Coalition Labour Coalition Labour was a description used by candidates in the 1918 United Kingdom general election who identified with trade unionism and supported the outgoing coalition government, which retained power at the election. The Labour Party had left ...

candidate, opposed by the official Labour Party candidate. After leaving office in 1920, Roberts returned as a director to the firm he had left as works manager upon entering Parliament in

1906 Events January–February * January 12 – Persian Constitutional Revolution: A nationalistic coalition of merchants, religious leaders and intellectuals in Persia forces the shah Mozaffar ad-Din Shah Qajar to grant a constitution, ...

. He sat on the back-benches and as an independent retained his seat in the 1922 election but lost it as the

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...

candidate in

1923 Events January–February * January 9 – Lithuania begins the Klaipėda Revolt to annex the Klaipėda Region (Memel Territory). * January 11 – Despite strong British protests, troops from France and Belgium occupy the Ruhr area, t ...

. Roberts spent the rest of his life in the

sugar beet A sugar beet is a plant whose root contains a high concentration of sucrose and which is grown commercially for sugar production. In plant breeding, it is known as the Altissima cultivar group of the common beet (''Beta vulgaris''). Together wi ...

industry. He died on 25 April 1928.

References

Bibliography

Meeres, Frank. ''George Roberts MP. A Life That 'Did Different. (Poppyland Publishing, 2019)

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Roberts, George Henry 1868 births 1928 deaths Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Norwich Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom Typographical Association-sponsored MPs UK MPs 1906–1910 UK MPs 1910 UK MPs 1910–1918 UK MPs 1918–1922 UK MPs 1922–1923 Coalition Labour MPs Chairs of the Labour Party (UK) Conservative Party (UK) parliamentary candidates Parliamentary Secretaries to the Board of Trade Independent members of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom