The Leader of the Conservatives in the European Parliament was the most senior

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 ...

Member of the European Parliament A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its ...

. The post was last held by

Geoffrey Van Orden Brigadier Geoffrey Charles Van Orden (born 10 April 1945) is a British politician and former British Army officer who served as Leader of the Conservatives in the European Parliament from 2019 to 2020. He was a Member of the European Parliamen ...

, who succeeded

Ashley Fox Sir Ashley Fox (born 15 November 1969)''Who's who'' for second forename,birthplace, parents, marriage and family details is a British Conservative Party politician. He was a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for South West England & Gibr ...

in 2019. His term ended after the United Kingdom’s

withdrawal from the European Union Withdrawal from the European Union is the legal and political process whereby an EU member state ceases to be a member of the Union. Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union ( TEU) states that "Any Member State may decide to withdraw from t ...

Leaders of Conservative MEPs (1973 to 2020)

{, class="wikitable" , + !Leader !Portrait !Constituency !Took Office !Left Office !Term Length , - , Sir Peter Kirk , ,

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 ...

for

Saffron Walden Saffron Walden is a market town in the Uttlesford district of Essex, England, north of Bishop's Stortford, south of Cambridge and north of London. It retains a rural appearance and some buildings of the medieval period. The population was 15, ...

, 1 January 1973 , 17 April 1977 , , - ,

Geoffrey Rippon Aubrey Geoffrey Frederick Rippon, Baron Rippon of Hexham, PC, QC (28 May 1924 – 28 January 1997) was a British Conservative Party politician. He is most known for drafting the European Communities Act 1972 which took the United Kingdom into ...

for

Hexham Hexham ( ) is a market town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in Northumberland, England, on the south bank of the River Tyne, formed by the confluence of the North Tyne and the South Tyne at Warden, Northumberland, Warden nearby, and ...

, 17 April 1977 , 7 July 1979 , , - ,

James Scott-Hopkins Sir James Sidney Rawdon Scott-Hopkins (29 November 1921 – 11 March 1995) was a British Conservative politician. Born in Croydon, Scott-Hopkins was educated at Eton College and the University of Oxford. He joined the British Army in 1939. He w ...

, ,

Hereford and Worcester Hereford and Worcester was an English non-metropolitan county created on 1 April 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972 from the areas of the former administrative county of Herefordshire, most of Worcestershire (except Halesowen, Stourbridge ...

, 7 July 1979 , 9 February 1982 , , - ,

Henry Plumb Charles Henry Plumb, Baron Plumb, (27 March 1925 – 15 April 2022) was a British politician and farmer who went into politics as a leader of the National Farmers' Union. He later became active in the Conservative Party and was elected as a M ...

, ,

Cotswold The Cotswolds (, ) is a region in central-southwest England, along a range of rolling hills that rise from the meadows of the upper Thames to an escarpment above the Severn Valley and Evesham Vale. The area is defined by the bedrock of Juras ...

, 9 February 1982 , 7 July 1987 , , - ,

Christopher Prout Christopher James Prout, Baron Kingsland (1 January 1942 – 12 July 2009) was a British barrister and Conservative Party politician. He is perhaps most well known for serving as the leader of the Conservative group of Members of the European P ...

, , Shropshire and Stafford , 7 July 1987 , 16 June 1994 , , - , Tom Spencer , ,

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

, 16 June 1994 , 16 September 1997 , , - , Edward McMillan-Scott , ,

Yorkshire and the Humber Yorkshire and the Humber is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. The population in 2011 was 5,284,000 with its largest settlements being Leeds, Sheffield, Bradford, Hull, and York. It is ...

, 16 September 1997 , 14 December 2001 , , - , Jonathan Evans , Evans, Jonathan (crop)

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

, 14 December 2001 , 14 December 2004 , , - ,

Timothy Kirkhope Timothy John Robert Kirkhope, Baron Kirkhope of Harrogate (born 29 April 1945) is a British lawyer and politician who previously served as Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for Yorkshire and the Humber for the Conservative Party. After ...

Timothy-Kirkhope-United-Kingdom-MIP-Europaparlamentby-Leila-Paul-4

, 14 December 2004 , 28 November 2007 , , - ,

Giles Chichester Giles Bryan Chichester (born 29 July 1946) is a British Conservative Party politician who was a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for South West England and Gibraltar from 1999 until he retired 2014. He was elected as Vice-President of th ...

, , South West England and Gibraltar , 28 November 2007 , 5 June 2008 , 190 days , - ,

Philip Bushill-Matthews Philip Bushill-Matthews (born 15 January 1943 in Droitwich) is a former British politician. He was Conservative Party Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the West Midlands. Biography At Oxford University he became President of the O.U ...

, ,

West Midlands West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some ...

, 5 June 2008 , 18 November 2008 , 167 days , - ,

, 18 November 2008 , 23 November 2010 , 2 years and 5 days , - ,

Martin Callanan Martin John Callanan, Baron Callanan (born 8 August 1961) is a British Conservative Party politician. He was Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for North East England from 1999 to 2014 and Chairman of the European Conservatives and Reformi ...

Official portrait of Lord Callanan crop 2

North East England North East England is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. The region has three current administrative levels below the region level in the region; combined authority, unitary authorit ...

, 23 November 2010 , 1 March 2012 , 1 year and 99 days , - ,

Richard Ashworth Richard James Ashworth (born 17 September 1947 in Folkestone) is a former Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for South East England for Change UK. He formerly sat in the European Parliament for the Conservative Party, and was that Party ...

, ,

South East England South East England is one of the nine official regions of England at the ITL 1 statistical regions of England, first level of International Territorial Level, ITL for Statistics, statistical purposes. It consists of the counties of england, ...

, 14 March 2012 , 19 November 2013 , 1 year and 250 days , - ,

Syed Kamall Syed Salah Kamall, Baron Kamall (born 15 February 1967) is a British politician and academic, who from September to October 2022 served in HM Government as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

, 19 November 2013 , 25 November 2014 , 1 year and 6 days , - ,

, South West England and Gibraltar , 25 November 2014{{Cite web, url=http://conservativeeurope.com/news/campaigning-mep-elected-to-lead-tories-in-brussels, title=Campaigning MEP elected to lead Tories in Brussels {{! Conservative MEPs, website=conservativeeurope.com, access-date=2018-03-17 , 11 June 2019 , 4 years and 198 days , - ,

East of England The East of England is one of the nine official regions of England. This region was created in 1994 and was adopted for statistics purposes from 1999. It includes the ceremonial counties of Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex, Hertfordshire ...

, 11 June 2019 , 31 January 2020 , 234 days

References

Conservative Party (UK)-related lists