Thomas Bish (5 May 1779 – 27 December 1842) was a British politician. Bish worked as a stockbroker and held a government contract for the lottery. At the 1826 UK general election, he stood in

Leominster Leominster ( ) is a market town in Herefordshire, England, at the confluence of the River Lugg and its tributary the River Kenwater. The town is north of Hereford and south of Ludlow in Shropshire. With a population of 11,700, Leominster is t ...

as a Whig. He was elected, but was unseated on an

election petition An election petition refers to the procedure for challenging the result of a Parliamentary election. Outcomes When a petition is lodged against an election return, there are 4 possible outcomes: # The election is declared void. The result is q ...

, due to the contract he held. The lottery was abolished in 1826, and this enabled Bish to stand again in Leominster at the

1832 UK general election The 1832 United Kingdom general election, the first after the Reform Act 1832, Reform Act, saw the Whigs (British political party), Whigs win a large majority, with the Tories winning less than 30% of the vote. Political situation The Charles ...

, winning the seat. In Parliament, he opposed the

Corn Law The Corn Laws were tariffs and other trade restrictions on imported food and corn enforced in the United Kingdom between 1815 and 1846. The word ''corn'' in British English denotes all cereal grains, including wheat, oats and barley. They were ...

, and supported a

secret ballot The secret ballot, also known as the Australian ballot, is a voting method in which a voter's identity in an election or a referendum is anonymous. This forestalls attempts to influence the voter by intimidation, blackmailing, and potential vote ...

and shorter Parliamentary terms. He argued that the

Bank of England The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom and the model on which most modern central banks have been based. Established in 1694 to act as the English Government's banker, and still one of the bankers for the Government of ...

should manufacture their banknotes in a manner which made them harder to forge, and that Parliament and the Court should sometimes meet in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...

. He also argued for the revival of the state lottery, arguing that since its abolition, many British citizens instead put money into lotteries based overseas. Bish held his seat at the

1835 UK general election The 1835 United Kingdom general election was called when Parliament was dissolved on 29 December 1834. Polling took place between 6 January and 6 February 1835, and the results saw Robert Peel's Conservatives make large gains from their low of ...

, but stood down in 1837.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bish, Thomas 1779 births 1842 deaths UK MPs 1826–1830 UK MPs 1832–1835 UK MPs 1835–1837 Whig (British political party) MPs for English constituencies