John Robert Leslie, MP (3 November 1873 – 12 January 1955) was a Labour Party politician in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

. He was born in

Lerwick Lerwick (; non, Leirvik; nrn, Larvik) is the main town and port of the Shetland archipelago, Scotland. Shetland's only burgh, Lerwick had a population of about 7,000 residents in 2010. Centred off the north coast of the Scottish mainland ...

Shetland Shetland, also called the Shetland Islands and formerly Zetland, is a subarctic archipelago in Scotland lying between Orkney, the Faroe Islands and Norway. It is the northernmost region of the United Kingdom. The islands lie about to the no ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

to John Leslie and Clementina Hunter. Leslie and his wife had 3 sons, John, William and Robert, and two daughters, Clementina and Alice. He moved to London from Edinburgh, where his first son was born, in 1912. 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

Sedgefield Sedgefield is a market town and civil parish in County Durham, England. It had a population of 5,211 as at the 2011 census. It has the only operating racecourse in County Durham. History Roman A Roman 'ladder settlement' was discovered by C ...

County Durham County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly �About North East E ...

at the 1935 general election, defeating the

Conservative Party The Conservative Party is a name used by many political parties around the world. These political parties are generally right-wing though their exact ideologies can range from center-right to far-right. Political parties called The Conservative P ...

MP Roland Jennings, who had been elected in 1931. When discussing the 1938 Hire Purchase Act, Leslie made

anti-Semitic Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

accusations over the apparent involvement of Jewish people in extortionate

hire-purchase A hire purchase (HP), also known as an installment plan, is an arrangement whereby a customer agrees to a contract to acquire an asset by paying an initial installment (e.g., 40% of the total) and repaying the balance of the price of the asset pl ...

agreements: ‘I do not want to raise racial prejudices, but hon. Members can guess his nationality'.Peter Scott, ‘The Twilight World of Interwar British Hire Purchase’, P&P 2002, p.220 John Leslie held the seat until he retired from the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...

at the 1950 general election.

References

Leslie: Births & baptisms - Caithness, Orkney & Shetland
* ;Specific

External links

* 1873 births 1955 deaths General Secretaries of the National Amalgamated Union of Shop Assistants, Warehousemen and Clerks Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies Members of the General Council of the Trades Union Congress National Amalgamated Union of Shop Assistants, Warehousemen and Clerks-sponsored MPs UK MPs 1935–1945 UK MPs 1945–1950 {{England-Labour-UK-MP-stub