Philip Norman Hocking (27 October 1925 – 17 August 2008) was a British

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 ...

politician in the

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. He 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 of ...

(MP) for Coventry South from 1959 to 1964. During his tenure in the

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he was

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(PPS) to the

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. Hocking's victory in Coventry was certainly an achievement as the constituency was seen as a fairly strong Labour Party area and indeed he remains to this day the only Conservative to have won the seat. He became a close friend of

Denys Bullard Denys Gradwell Bullard (15 August 1912 – 2 November 1994) was a British farmer and politician. Although he was an entertaining speaker, his political career was a precarious one as he was only elected in marginal constituencies. Farming backg ...

, another Conservative MP with agricultural interests whose seat depended on a small and hard-won majority in a difficult constituency. Hocking's most memorable contribution to the politics of the day was when he appeared on

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following the

Profumo affair The Profumo affair was a major scandal in twentieth-century Politics of the United Kingdom, British politics. John Profumo, the Secretary of State for War in Harold Macmillan's Conservative Party (UK), Conservative government, had an extramar ...

. Hocking was asked if

Harold Macmillan Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986) was a British Conservative statesman and politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1957 to 1963. Caricatured as "Supermac", he ...

was finished politically; Hocking compared Macmillan to a pheasant once it has been shot. "It may have been shot," he said, "but it is still going to run and run." Having replaced Elaine Burton at the 1959 general election with the song "High Hopes" as his anthem, Hocking lost the 1964 election to William Wilson. He lived in the

Cotswolds 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 Jur ...

throughout the rest of life, although latterly he had spent much time in

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References

* *

Times Guide to the House of Commons ''The Times Guide to the House of Commons'' is a political reference guide book published by Times Newspapers giving coverage of general elections in the United Kingdom. Following most general elections since 1880, the book has been published. The ...

1964

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hocking, Philip 1925 births 2008 deaths Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies UK MPs 1959–1964