Francis Nigel Forman (25 March 1943 – 11 May 2017), known as Nigel Forman, was a British
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 ...
politician
A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, a ...
. After working in the
Conservative Research Department
The Conservative Research Department (CRD) is part of the central organisation of the Conservative Party in the United Kingdom. It operates alongside other departments of Conservative Campaign Headquarters in Westminster.
The CRD has been describ ...
from 1968 to 1976 he was elected as an
MP. He became a junior minister, Minister of Higher Education, in April 1992, but resigned from that office after 8 months.
Forman lost his Parliamentary seat in the
1997 general election. He later worked as a lecturer, academic writer and Parliamentary expert/instructor. He was married to Susan Forman in 1971. The couple had no children.
Early career
Forman was born in
Simla
Shimla (; ; also known as Simla, the official name until 1972) is the capital and the largest city of the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. In 1864, Shimla was declared as the summer capital of British India. After independence, the ...
, India where his father served as a brigadier in the Indian Army. Forman was educated at the
Dragon School
("Reach for the Sun")
, established = 1877
, closed =
, type = Preparatory day and boarding school and Pre-Prep school
, religion = Church of England
, president =
, head_label = Head
, head = Emma Goldsm ...
,
Shrewsbury School
Shrewsbury School is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 13 –18) in Shrewsbury.
Founded in 1552 by Edward VI by Royal Charter, it was originally a boarding school for boys; girls have been admitted into the ...
,
New College, Oxford
New College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1379 by William of Wykeham in conjunction with Winchester College as its feeder school, New College is one of the oldest colleges at th ...
,
College of Europe
The College of Europe (french: Collège d'Europe) is a post-graduate institute of European studies with its main campus in Bruges, Belgium and a second campus in Warsaw, Poland. The College of Europe in Bruges was founded in 1949 by leading ...
(Bruges),
Harvard
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
and
Sussex University
, mottoeng = Be Still and Know
, established =
, type = Public research university
, endowment = £14.4 million (2020)
, budget = £319.6 million (2019–20)
, chancellor = Sanjeev Bhaskar
, vice_chancellor = Sasha Roseneil
, ...
. He obtained various degrees from the latter four including a
Master of Public Administration
The Master of Public Administration (M.P.Adm., M.P.A., or MPA) is a specialized higher professional post graduate degree in public administration, similar/ equivalent to the Master of Business Administration but with an emphasis on the issues of ...
from Harvard, a
Certificate of Advanced European Studies (equivalent to a master's degree) from the College of Europe (class of 1965–66) and a
Ph.D
A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common Academic degree, degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields ...
from
Sussex University
, mottoeng = Be Still and Know
, established =
, type = Public research university
, endowment = £14.4 million (2020)
, budget = £319.6 million (2019–20)
, chancellor = Sanjeev Bhaskar
, vice_chancellor = Sasha Roseneil
, ...
. In his ''Times'' obituary he was described as "something of a perpetual student". His first significant job was from 1967 to 1968 as an information officer at the
Confederation of British Industry
The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) is a UK business organisation, which in total claims to speak for 190,000 businesses, this is made up of around 1,500 direct members and 188,500 non-members. The non members are represented through the 1 ...
.
In 1968 he joined the Conservative Research Department ('CRD' – the research operation of the party) and began the quest to find himself a seat in Parliament. He progressed rapidly in the CRD, acting as ‘external affairs adviser’ to Official Opposition leader
Heath
A heath () is a shrubland habitat found mainly on free-draining infertile, acidic soils and characterised by open, low-growing woody vegetation. Moorland is generally related to high-ground heaths with—especially in Great Britain—a cooler ...
. He served
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. S ...
in the same capacity from 1975 to 1976. He was promoted to Assistant Director with special responsibility for European affairs.
He contested the
Coventry North East seat as a member of the party in the
February 1974 contest but was not elected. After the elevation of
Robert Carr
Leonard Robert Carr, Baron Carr of Hadley, (11 November 1916 – 17 February 2012) was a British Conservative Party politician who served as Home Secretary from 1972 to 1974. He served as a Member of Parliament (MP) for 26 years, and later ser ...
to the peerage in 1976, Forman was centrally recommended and selected as his replacement for the resultant by-election.
Backbench MP
Forman was elected to 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. ...
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
Carshalton
Carshalton () is a town, with a historic village centre, in south London, England, within the London Borough of Sutton. It is situated south-southwest of Charing Cross, in the valley of the River Wandle, one of the sources of which is Carshalton ...
at its
by-election
A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...
on 11 March 1976. He took the seat with a 10,000 majority over Labour, compared with Carr's 4,000 majority in October 1974. When the seat's boundaries were revised for the
1983 election it was renamed
Carshalton and Wallington.
The seat, the eastern half of the
London Borough of Sutton
The London Borough of Sutton () is a London borough in south-west London, England and forms part of Outer London. It covers an area of and is the 80th largest local authority in England by population. It borders the London Borough of Croydon to ...
, was socially mixed. In 1976 it had much social housing yet had streets of expensive detached houses and many middle class voters. All three major parties (Conservative, Labour and Liberal) had entrenched support and Forman's lead looked vulnerable to
tactical voting
Strategic voting, also called tactical voting, sophisticated voting or insincere voting, occurs in voting systems when a voter votes for another candidate or party than their ''sincere preference'' to prevent an undesirable outcome. For example, ...
. The local Conservative leaders of the Council soon showed themselves to be resistant to concepts of modernisation that Forman espoused. Sutton was one of the few remaining councils in the UK that kept
selective education
A selective school is a school that admits students on the basis of some sort of selection criteria, usually academic. The term may have different connotations in different systems and is the opposite of a comprehensive school, which accepts all s ...
and council meetings were unusual in that Conservative councillors wore ceremonial robes to "give dignity" to them.
Forman soon established himself as a bright and enthusiastic MP. During his first three months in the House he asked 64 formal questions of Ministers in the Labour government. His particular interests were nuclear power,
incomes policy
Incomes policies in economics are economy-wide wage and price controls, most commonly instituted as a response to inflation, and usually seeking to establish wages and prices below free market level.
Incomes policies have often been resorted to ...
, education policy and ministerial patronage. After the Conservatives returned to government in 1979, it was widely expected that Forman would soon obtain ministerial office. He served as
Parliamentary Private Secretary
A Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) is a Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom who acts as an unpaid assistant to a minister or shadow minister. They are selected from backbench MPs as the 'eyes and ears' of the minister in the H ...
(PPS) first to
Lord Carrington
Peter Alexander Rupert Carington, 6th Baron Carrington, Baron Carington of Upton, (6 June 1919 – 9July 2018), was a British Conservative Party politician and hereditary peer who served as Defence Secretary from 1970 to 1974, Foreign Secret ...
in the Foreign Office and later to
Douglas Hurd
Douglas Richard Hurd, Baron Hurd of Westwell, (born 8 March 1930) is a British Conservative Party politician who served in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major from 1979 to 1995.
A career diplomat and political secretary to P ...
in the Home Office.
Forman soon became known as a moderate Conservative who differed with some of Thatcher's policies. In 1980 he spoke for greatly increasing child benefits and
James Prior
James Michael Leathes Prior, Baron Prior, (11 October 1927 – 12 December 2016) was a British Conservative Party politician. A Member of Parliament from 1959 to 1987, he represented the Suffolk constituency of Lowestoft until 1983 and then ...
’s attempt to have member votes bind trade unions through their voluntary agreement to do so. That year he was in the majorities who opposed reintroducing
capital punishment
Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...
and limiting abortion rights. He also expressed alarm at mounting unemployment arising from the government’s economic and financial policies. He frequently called for a "one nation" approach in his speeches and writings. He disapproved of government policies which promoted London-bound internal migration and were socially divisive. He favoured closer integration of Britain with the
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...
.
In February 1981, Labour MPs cheered him in the House when he asked the Chancellor (Howe) to act to halt the rise in unemployment. Forman advocated employment and economic policies which were broadly consistent with those pursued by the
Callaghan ministry Callaghan most commonly refers to O'Callaghan, an Anglicized Irish surname.
Callaghan may also refer to:
Places
* Callaghan, New South Wales, Australia
* Callaghan, Edmonton, Canada
* Callaghan, Virginia, United States
* Callaghan, Texas, United ...
. He was seen as a Conservative opponent of
Thatcherism
Thatcherism is a form of British conservative ideology named after Conservative Party leader Margaret Thatcher that relates to not just her political platform and particular policies but also her personal character and general style of manag ...
. All this raised his profile in the House but it did not enhance his promotion prospects. In a 1983 ''Times'' piece senior Labour MP
Gerald Kaufman
Sir Gerald Bernard Kaufman (21 June 1930 – 26 February 2017) was a British politician and author who served as a minister throughout the Labour government of 1974 to 1979. Elected as a member of parliament (MP) at the 1970 general election, ...
noted that Forman had been overlooked for promotion and that his obvious abilities were not being used.
In 1984 Forman stood for Chairman of the Conservative backbench finance committee, as a moderate "one nation" Tory – against incumbent right-winger Sir William Clark. Forman lost but had become clearly identified with "wets" and the
one-nation group of Tory MPs. In 1985, Forman published a pamphlet ''Work to be done : employment policy for 1985 and beyond''. This was deeply critical of government policy and advocated a package of measures to stimulate employment.
Forman's progressive views did not endear him to his party's leaders in his local Council and association. Many of them regarded him as disloyal to Margaret Thatcher and a traitor. There were repeated attempts to deselect him. Matters came to a head in 1986 after the Liberal-SDP Alliance gained political control of the Council. Forman publicly attributed this to the shortcomings of the local Conservative leadership.
The matter is described in the following extract from an article in ''The Times'' on 21 May 1987:
''“The Carshalton Conservative Association suffers from bigots and zealots who indulge in internecine warfare.” Not Labour smear tactics, nor Alliance innuendo, but the words of its Conservative MP, Mr Nigel Forman. Several attempts to deselect Mr Forman failed. But when the election was called last week, five of the seven senior officers took their revenge on the beleaguered MP by resigning.'' – ''The Times'', May 1987.
However, Forman comfortably held his seat in the
1987 general election. His advocacy of redistributive but market-led policies was coupled with lack of a clear single Labour or Liberal/SDP opponent. This made Forman an acceptable candidate to many local voters who refrained from tactical voting to oust him. Forman won 54% of the vote, on high turnout,
His political fortunes seemed to be in the ascendant.
''“Has Chancellor Nigel Lawson gone soft? Yesterday he appointed as his PPS a Tory so wet he drips. As recently as last year, Nigel Forman, vice-chairman of the party's backbench finance committee, was publicly calling on the Chancellor to 'give top priority to the unemployment challenge'. The year before, in Mastering British Politics, he wrote: 'Occasionally, in the course of its long history, the Conservative party has been swept along on the wave of some particular ideology, but such periods have not usually lasted or brought enduring political success'.”'' – "Rising Damp", ''The Times'', June 1987.
The ideology Forman referred to was the then fashionable combination of
supply side economics
Supply-side economics is a macroeconomic theory that postulates economic growth can be most effectively fostered by lowering taxes, decreasing regulation, and allowing free trade. According to supply-side economics, consumers will benefit fr ...
,
monetarism
Monetarism is a school of thought in monetary economics that emphasizes the role of governments in controlling the amount of money in circulation. Monetarist theory asserts that variations in the money supply have major influences on measures ...
,
deregulation
Deregulation is the process of removing or reducing state regulations, typically in the economic sphere. It is the repeal of governmental regulation of the economy. It became common in advanced industrial economies in the 1970s and 1980s, as a ...
and
privatisation
Privatization (also privatisation in British English) can mean several different things, most commonly referring to moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation when ...
known in the 1980s as
Thatcherism
Thatcherism is a form of British conservative ideology named after Conservative Party leader Margaret Thatcher that relates to not just her political platform and particular policies but also her personal character and general style of manag ...
. After Mrs Thatcher was forced from office in late 1990 it was considered only a matter of time before Forman would be promoted.
Later Parliamentary career
''“The omission of Nigel Forman, from successive ministerial reshuffles over the past few years has surprised many at Westminster when several apparently less talented politicians have secured top posts. But after 16 years in the Commons, he has become an under-secretary at the education department”''
Immediately after the
general election in April 1992 Forman was appointed Under Secretary of State for Education (with the job title Minister of Higher and Further Education) under Education Secretary
John Patten. During his tenure of office, Forman dealt with high-profile issues such as the financing of student unions, student loans and the quality assurance of degrees issued by the new universities. Forman unexpectedly resigned from his ministerial post on 11 December 1992 for "personal reasons". The nature of those personal reasons was never disclosed. Colleagues commented that Forman was "a very private man" and nobody claimed to know why he had resigned.
Thereafter, Forman's political career went into decline. His political interests appeared to become more theoretical in nature. In January 1996 the
Demos 'think tank' published a paper written by him on reform of the income tax system. Demos was generally considered to be closely associated with
New Labour
New Labour was a period in the history of the British Labour Party from the mid to late 1990s until 2010 under the leadership of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. The name dates from a conference slogan first used by the party in 1994, later seen ...
. At the
1997 general election, Forman lost his seat to the
Liberal Democrat
Several political party, political parties from around the world have been called the Liberal Democratic Party or Liberal Democrats. These parties usually follow a liberal democracy, liberal democratic ideology.
Active parties
Former parties ...
candidate
Tom Brake
Thomas Anthony Brake (born 6 May 1962) is a British Liberal Democrat politician. He was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Carshalton and Wallington in London from 1997 to 2019.
He was appointed Director of the cross party pressure group Unlock ...
. Forman's 10,000 vote majority in the
1992 general election was converted into a 2,000 vote Liberal Democrat majority with a 12% swing from Conservative to Lib Dem.
After Parliament
Forman initially developed a portfolio of lecturing and writing work. In 1999 he joined the faculty of
Wroxton College
Wroxton Abbey is a Jacobean house in Oxfordshire, with a 1727 garden partly converted to the serpentine style between 1731 and 1751. It is west of Banbury, off the A422 road in Wroxton. It is now the English campus of Fairleigh Dickinson Univ ...
, the UK (Oxfordshire) campus of
Fairleigh Dickinson University
Fairleigh Dickinson University is a private university with its main campuses in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Founded in 1942, Fairleigh Dickinson University currently offers more than 100 degree programs to its students. In addition to its tw ...
(FDU).
Forman delivered courses for ‘Westminster Explained’, Parliament's own in-house training facility which provides courses to members of both Houses and the wider public service. He was a visiting lecturer at
Essex University
The University of Essex is a public university, public research university in Essex, England. Established by royal charter in 1965, Essex is one of the original plate glass university, plate glass universities. Essex's shield consists of the an ...
and an honorary research fellow at
University College London
, mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward
, established =
, type = Public research university
, endowment = £143 million (2020)
, budget = ...
.
Forman died of dementia-related issues on 11 May 2017. In the last year of his life he was reported to have been dismayed by the result of the 2016
Brexit referendum
The United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, commonly referred to as the EU referendum or the Brexit referendum, took place on 23 June 2016 in the United Kingdom (UK) and Gibraltar to ask the electorate whether the country shoul ...
and to have stated that the UK had become a country he hardly knew. However, obituarists drew attention to his comment (quoted above) published thirty years earlier concerning the tendency of the Conservative party to be occasionally swept along in particular ideologies.
Bibliography
His later, most notable, publications were:
*''Constitutional Change in the UK'' (2004)
*''Mastering British Politics'' (co-editor)
*''Mastering British Politics'' (with N. D. J. Baldwin)
["Forman, (Francis) Nigel, (25 March 1943–11 May 2017), Hon. Senior Research Fellow, Constitution Unit, University College London, since 2002." WHO'S WHO & WHO WAS WHO. 1 Dec. 2007; Accessed 13 Dec. 2020. https://www.ukwhoswho.com/view/10.1093/ww/9780199540891.001.0001/ww-9780199540884-e-16118.]
Notes and references
;Footnotes
;References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Forman, Nigel
1943 births
2017 deaths
Place of birth missing
College of Europe alumni
Alumni of New College, Oxford
Fairleigh Dickinson University faculty
Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies
UK MPs 1974–1979
UK MPs 1979–1983
UK MPs 1983–1987
UK MPs 1987–1992
UK MPs 1992–1997
Alumni of the University of Sussex
Harvard Kennedy School alumni