Timothy Stephen Kenneth Yeo (born 20 March 1945) is a British politician. A member of 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 ...
, he was the
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 the constituency of
South Suffolk between the
1983 United Kingdom general election
The 1983 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 9 June 1983. It gave the Conservative Party under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher the most decisive election victory since that of the Labour Party in 1945, with a majority of 1 ...
and that of
2015
File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the Apri ...
, when he was deselected by his constituency party.
Yeo served as the Minister for the Environment and Countryside from 1993 to 1994 in the government of Prime Minister
John Major
Sir John Major (born 29 March 1943) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 1990 to 1997, and as Member of Parliament ...
. He also served in the
Shadow Cabinet from 1998 to 2005 under Conservative Party leaders
William Hague
William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...
,
Iain Duncan Smith
Sir George Iain Duncan Smith (born George Ian Duncan Smith; 9 April 1954), often referred to by his initials IDS, is a British politician who served as Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from 2001 to 2003. He was S ...
and
Michael Howard
Michael Howard, Baron Howard of Lympne (born Michael Hecht; 7 July 1941) is a British politician who served as Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from November 2003 to December 2005. He previously held cabinet posi ...
.
Early life
Yeo was educated at
Charterhouse School
(God having given, I gave)
, established =
, closed =
, type = Public school Independent day and boarding school
, religion = Church of England
, president ...
, before going on to
Emmanuel College, Cambridge
Emmanuel College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1584 by Sir Walter Mildmay, Chancellor of the Exchequer to Elizabeth I. The site on which the college sits was once a priory for Dominican mon ...
where he read History and graduated in 1968. At university he "did no work, got a poor degree and adored it".
From 1970–73, Yeo was Assistant Treasurer of
Bankers Trust
Bankers Trust was a historic American banking organization. The bank merged with Alex. Brown & Sons in 1997 before being acquired by Deutsche Bank in 1999. Deutsche Bank sold the Trust and Custody division of Bankers Trust to State Street Corpor ...
Company. Then, from 1975–86, he was a Director of Worcester Engineering Company. From 1980–83, he was Chief Executive of the Spastics Society (now known as
Scope
Scope or scopes may refer to:
People with the surname
* Jamie Scope (born 1986), English footballer
* John T. Scopes (1900–1970), central figure in the Scopes Trial regarding the teaching of evolution
Arts, media, and entertainment
* Cinem ...
).
The
Tadworth Court Children's Hospital was founded in 1984 under his chairmanship after
Great Ormond Street Hospital
Great Ormond Street Hospital (informally GOSH or Great Ormond Street, formerly the Hospital for Sick Children) is a children's hospital located in the Bloomsbury area of the London Borough of Camden, and a part of Great Ormond Street Hospital ...
had decided to relinquish the building in 1982. He resigned in the early nineties because of his parliamentary workload and was succeeded by
Archie Norman.
Political career
Yeo contested
Bedwellty
Bedwellty is a small village in Caerphilly County Borough in south Wales. The village stands on a ridge of high ground between the Rhymney and Sirhowy valleys. The village comprises a parish church, public house and a few houses. The ancient pa ...
in the
February 1974 general election before being elected as MP for
South Suffolk in 1983, replacing
Sudbury & Woodbridge MP
Keith Stainton
Keith Monin Stainton (8 November 1921 – 3 November 2001) was a British Conservative politician World War II decorated veteran.
Keith Stainton was born in Kendal, Westmorland, the son of a Kendal butcher father and a Belgian refugee mother who ...
who he defeated in the selection contest for South Suffolk.
He asked the first televised Prime Minister's Question to
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 ...
on 28 November 1989.
In government
In 1988, he became the
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 ...
to the
Home Secretary
The secretary of state for the Home Department, otherwise known as the home secretary, is a senior minister of the Crown in the Government of the United Kingdom. The home secretary leads the Home Office, and is responsible for all national ...
,
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 ...
and in 1990 was appointed Parliamentary Under Secretary for Housing and Planning. After the
1992 general election Yeo became Parliamentary Under Secretary for Health.
In 1993, Yeo was appointed Minister for the Environment and Countryside in
John Major's government, but was forced to resign after a scandal involving his so-called "love child" with a Conservative councillor, Julia Stent, who was born on 8 July 1993. Three years earlier, Yeo had said to the branch of
Relate
Relate is a charity providing relationship support throughout the United Kingdom. Services include counselling for couples, families, young people and individuals, sex therapy, mediation and training courses. Relate also offers online services ...
in his constituency, "It is in everyone's interests to reduce broken families and the number of single parents. I have seen from my own constituency the consequences of marital breakdown." The story broke on
Boxing Day
Boxing Day is a holiday celebrated after Christmas Day, occurring on the second day of Christmastide (26 December). Though it originated as a holiday to give gifts to the poor, today Boxing Day is primarily known as a shopping holiday. It ...
during a quiet news period and intense coverage was given to the scandal. Yeo resigned on 5 January 1994; he was the first ministerial casualty of the media reaction to John Major's
Back to Basics campaign.
In opposition
After the Conservatives' defeat in the
1997 general election, the party's new leader
William Hague
William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...
appointed Yeo as a spokesman on the Environment, Transport and the Regions. He was promoted to the Shadow Cabinet as Shadow Minister of Agriculture in 1998. In 2001, he played a leading role in exposing the Government's mishandling of the Foot and Mouth Disease epidemic.
Yeo was a member of
Iain Duncan Smith
Sir George Iain Duncan Smith (born George Ian Duncan Smith; 9 April 1954), often referred to by his initials IDS, is a British politician who served as Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from 2001 to 2003. He was S ...
's Shadow Cabinet as Shadow
Secretary of State for Trade and Industry
The secretary of state for business, energy and industrial strategy, is a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, with responsibility for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. The incumbent is a memb ...
. In 2003, Yeo was made Shadow Secretary for Education and Health by the party's new leader,
Michael Howard
Michael Howard, Baron Howard of Lympne (born Michael Hecht; 7 July 1941) is a British politician who served as Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from November 2003 to December 2005. He previously held cabinet posi ...
, with responsibility for the party's policy on both schools and hospitals. In 2004, Howard made Yeo the Shadow Secretary for the Environment and Transport.
Yeo resigned from the shadow cabinet shortly after the
2005 general election, saying he wished to be free to play a role in rethinking the Conservative Party's future. On 27 August, he ruled himself out of the ensuing party leadership election following Howard's resignation, announcing his backing for former
Chancellor of the Exchequer
The chancellor of the Exchequer, often abbreviated to chancellor, is a senior minister of the Crown within the Government of the United Kingdom, and head of His Majesty's Treasury. As one of the four Great Offices of State, the Chancellor is ...
Kenneth Clarke
Kenneth Harry Clarke, Baron Clarke of Nottingham, (born 2 July 1940), often known as Ken Clarke, is a British politician who served as Home Secretary from 1992 to 1993 and Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1993 to 1997 as well as serving as de ...
. The contest was won by the then-Shadow
Secretary of State for Education and Skills
The secretary of state for education, also referred to as the education secretary, is a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, responsible for the work of the Department for Education. The incumbent is a member of the Ca ...
,
David Cameron
David William Donald Cameron (born 9 October 1966) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2010 to 2016 and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2005 to 2016. He previously served as Leader o ...
.
Committee Chair
As Chair of the
Energy and Climate Change Select Committee
The Energy and Climate Change Select Committee was a select committee of the House of Commons in the Parliament of the United Kingdom that came into existence on 1 January 2009.
Formation
The House of Commons agreed to the committee's establish ...
, Yeo was an influential voice on energy policy. Despite his committee releasing a report sceptical of
hydraulic fracturing in the United Kingdom, Yeo revised his personal opinion and supported the use of the technique in the UK. In 2012, he announced that he supported the proposal for a third runway at
Heathrow Airport
Heathrow Airport (), called ''London Airport'' until 1966 and now known as London Heathrow , is a major international airport in London, England. It is the largest of the six international airports in the London airport system (the others be ...
, and that his long-held "environmental objections" to expansion were "disappearing". In 2013, he stated that the government reaching an agreement over nuclear power expansion was a "matter of great urgency", and warned that Britain could run out of energy if negotiations were not concluded quickly.
On 9 June 2013, ''
The Sunday Times
''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...
'' alleged, citing video evidence of a conversation with the MP, that he had helped "coach" a solar energy company executive for an appearance before his parliamentary committee; the parent company pays Yeo. The MP referred himself to the
Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards
The Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards is an officer of the British House of Commons. The work of the officer is overseen by the Commons Select Committee on Standards.
The current commissioner is Kathryn Stone.
Duties
The commissioner is i ...
, and said that he intended to fight the claims made against him. On 24 November 2015, he lost his
libel
Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...
action against the newspaper in the
High Court, with judge
Mr Justice Warby saying that the newspaper's reporting was "substantially true" and describing Mr Yeo's evidence as "unreliable" and "untruthful", with one part being "unworthy of belief".
''The Telegraph'' suggested this should also raise questions about
Kathryn Hudson
Kathryn Margaret Hudson (born 28 March 1949) was the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards for the United Kingdom House of Commons. Appointed in September 2012, she served until 31 December 2017.
She was previously (from 2008) Deputy Parliame ...
's performance as Standards Commissioner, as she had previously cleared Mr Yeo of breaching the rules on lobbying ministers for financial reward and of bringing the Commons into disrepute.
On 9 June 2013 he temporarily "stepped aside" as the chair of the committee. The
Liberal Democrat
Several political parties from around the world have been called the Liberal Democratic Party or Liberal Democrats. These parties usually follow a liberal democratic ideology.
Active parties
Former parties
See also
*Liberal democracy
*Lib ...
Sir Robert Smith replaced him on an interim basis.
Deselection
Yeo was deselected for the
2015 general election in a secret ballot of
South Suffolk Conservative Party members on 29 November 2013.
He remained the MP for the constituency until the election in May 2015.
Business interests
Previously he has been chairman of AFC Energy, Univent plc, TMO Renewables
and Eco City Vehicles plc. TMO Renewables collapsed, leading Yeo to be sued by former stakeholders for misleading them in early 2018.
He and his wife Diane are sole directors of Locana Corporation (London) Ltd., Anacol Holdings Ltd. and General Securities Register Ltd. He is also a director of ITI Energy Ltd. He also writes articles for ''
Golf Weekly
Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various Golf club, clubs to hit Golf ball, balls into a series of holes on a golf course, course in as few strokes as possible.
Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standar ...
'' and ''
Country Life'' magazines and, occasionally, the ''
Financial Times
The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nik ...
''.
Yeo occupies a seat on the board of
Eurotunnel
Getlink, formerly Groupe Eurotunnel, is a European public company based in Paris that manages and operates the infrastructure of the Channel Tunnel between England and France, operates the Eurotunnel Shuttle train service, and earns revenue on ...
. In June 2013 ''
The Sunday Times
''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...
'' released a video in which Yeo claimed to have told a representative of
GB Railfreight
GB Railfreight (GBRf) is a rail freight company in the United Kingdom. As of 2022, it is owned by the global investment company Infracapital.
GB Railfreight was established in April 1999 as the rail freight operating subsidiary of the train o ...
(a subsidiary of Eurotunnel) how to act in front of the
Energy and Climate Change Select Committee
The Energy and Climate Change Select Committee was a select committee of the House of Commons in the Parliament of the United Kingdom that came into existence on 1 January 2009.
Formation
The House of Commons agreed to the committee's establish ...
, saying he was "able to tell him in advance what to say". Yeo had earlier excused himself from the committee, on the grounds that he might be "biased" if he questioned an employee of a company for which he himself worked, and rejected the claims.
Political funding
Yeo received £67,290 in remunerations from corporate donors for work done for AFC Energy PLC, a developer of alkaline fuel cells focused on industrial application. From other corporate donors, he received £372,419 in other remunerations, from companies including TMO Renewables Limited, Groupe Eurotunnel SA, and Eco City Vehicles.
Post-parliamentary career
Yeo is chairman of New Nuclear Watch Europe and chairs the
University of Sheffield
, mottoeng = To discover the causes of things
, established = – University of SheffieldPredecessor institutions:
– Sheffield Medical School – Firth College – Sheffield Technical School – University College of Sheffield
, type = Pu ...
Industrial Advisory Board for the Energy 2050 initiative.
Personal life
Yeo married Diane Helen Pickard on 30 March 1970 in
Greenwich
Greenwich ( , ,) is a town in south-east London, England, within the ceremonial county of Greater London. It is situated east-southeast of Charing Cross.
Greenwich is notable for its maritime history and for giving its name to the Greenwich ...
. They have a son, the portrait painter
Jonathan Yeo
Jonathan Yeo (born 18 December 1970, in London, England) is a British artist who rose to international prominence in his early 20s as a contemporary portraitist, having painted Kevin Spacey, Dennis Hopper, Cara Delevingne, Damien Hirst, Prince ...
, and a daughter.
Yeo also has at least two more daughters from outside his marriage. He fathered his first daughter in 1967 when he was still a student at Cambridge University and put her up for adoption. Another daughter was born in 1993 through an extra-marital affair.
References
External links
*
Profileat the Conservative Party
Suffolk Conservatives*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yeo, Tim
1945 births
Living people
Alumni of Emmanuel College, Cambridge
Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies
Country Life (magazine) people
People educated at Charterhouse School
UK MPs 1983–1987
UK MPs 1987–1992
UK MPs 1992–1997
UK MPs 1997–2001
UK MPs 2001–2005
UK MPs 2005–2010
UK MPs 2010–2015