Thomas McLaughlin McAvoy, Baron McAvoy, (born 14 December 1943) is a British

Labour and Co-operative Labour and Co-operative Party (often abbreviated Labour Co-op; cy, Llafur a'r Blaid Gydweithredol) is a description used by candidates in United Kingdom elections who stand on behalf of both the Labour Party and the Co-operative Party. Candida ...

politician serving as a life peer in the

House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminste ...

since 2010. He served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Glasgow Rutherglen from 1987 to 2005, and

Rutherglen and Hamilton West Rutherglen and Hamilton West is a burgh constituency of the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which was created for the 2005 general election. It covers almost all of the former constituency of Glasgow Rutherglen and ...

from 2005 to 2010. McAvoy held several positions in the Government Whips' Office under the Blair and

Brown Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model us ...

governments, serving as Comptroller of the Household from 1997 to 2008 and

Treasurer of the Household The Treasurer of the Household is a member of the Royal Household of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. The position is usually held by one of the government deputy Chief Whips in the House of Commons. The current holder of the office is Mar ...

from 2008 to 2010. He entered the Lords after choosing not to seek re-election to the Commons, where he served as an Opposition Spokesperson for Scotland and Northern Ireland, as well as a Senior Whip. McAvoy held the position of Lords Opposition Chief Whip from 2018 to 2021 after serving as Deputy Chief Whip from 2015 to 2018.

Early life and career

McAvoy was born in

Rutherglen Rutherglen (, sco, Ruglen, gd, An Ruadh-Ghleann) is a town in South Lanarkshire, Scotland, immediately south-east of the city of Glasgow, from its centre and directly south of the River Clyde. Having existed as a Lanarkshire burgh in its own ...

Lanarkshire Lanarkshire, also called the County of Lanark ( gd, Siorrachd Lannraig; sco, Lanrikshire), is a historic county, lieutenancy area and registration county in the central Lowlands of Scotland. Lanarkshire is the most populous county in Scotl ...

on 14 December 1943. He worked in a pawnbrokers,From a pawnbrokers to Parliament - Tommy McAvoy looks back on a career that took him to the House of Lords
Marc McLean, Daily Record, 11 September 2018. Retrieved 1 January 2022. as a storeman at the Hoover factory in Cambuslang, and was a shop steward for the Amalgamated Engineering Union; following the succession of trade union mergers, he is now a member of

Unite the Union Unite the Union, commonly known as Unite, is a British and Irish trade union which was formed on 1 May 2007 by the merger of Amicus and the Transport and General Workers' Union (TGWU). Unite is the second largest trade union in the UK (afte ...

( Amicus Section). In 1982, McAvoy was elected to

Strathclyde Regional Council Strathclyde ( in Gaelic, meaning "strath (valley) of the River Clyde") was one of nine former local government regions of Scotland created in 1975 by the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 and abolished in 1996 by the Local Government ...

, and served until 1987.

Parliamentary career

McAvoy was elected to Parliament in 1987 as the Scottish Labour and Co-operative Member for Glasgow Rutherglen. Along with Robert Brown of the

Scottish Liberal Democrats The Scottish Liberal Democrats ( gd, Pàrtaidh Libearal Deamocratach na h-Alba, sco, Scots Leeberal Democrats) is a liberal, federalist political party in Scotland, a part of the United Kingdom Liberal Democrats. The party currently holds 4 o ...

, he successfully campaigned for his hometown (an independent

royal burgh A royal burgh () was a type of Scottish burgh which had been founded by, or subsequently granted, a royal charter. Although abolished by law in 1975, the term is still used by many former royal burghs. Most royal burghs were either created by ...

from the 1100s to the 1970s) to be removed from the district of Glasgow and allocated to South Lanarkshire ahead of local authority re-organisation in

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which sank in the Baltic Sea; Nelson ...

, via a local referendum. From 2005 to 2010, he sat as the member for

. He was an opposition whip from 1990 to 1993 and again from 1996 to 1997. When the Labour Party came into government in 1997, McAvoy was appointed as Comptroller of HM Household, the third highest position in the Government Whips' office. He retained the same job until 2008, becoming one of the longest serving Comptrollers in history. He was appointed to the Privy Council in 2003. In October 2008, he was promoted to

and Deputy Chief Whip. McAvoy has achieved the rare feat among whips of remaining popular with Labour MPs. An

early day motion In the Westminster parliamentary system, an early day motion (EDM) is a motion, expressed as a single sentence, tabled by members of Parliament that formally calls for debate "on an early day". In practice, they are rarely debated in the House a ...

in July 2006 noted "the difficult task he has of securing government business whilst accommodating the parliamentary, political and personal requirements of 352 Labour colleagues" and congratulated him for "the respect he has earned from all sides of the House for his ability to perform these duties"; it was signed by 135 MPs. On 20 February 2010, McAvoy announced that he would stand down at the next general election. The seat was retained by Labour with the election of

Tom Greatrex Thomas James Greatrex (born 30 September 1974) is a British Labour and Co-operative, Labour Co-op politician, who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (UK Parliament constituency), Rutherglen and Hamilton West betw ...

. On 22 June 2010, McAvoy was created a life peer as Baron McAvoy, of Rutherglen in Lanarkshire, and was introduced in the

that day. He remains to this day the longest serving Government Whip in the history of parliament with 13 years and 10 days service in the Government Whips Office. According to ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'': "... ispersonal crusades have been for peace in Northern Ireland and against abortion" (

Andrew Roth Andrew Roth (23 April 1919 – 12 August 2010) was a biographer and journalist known for his compilation of ''Parliamentary Profiles'', a directory of biographies of British Members of Parliament, a small sample of which is available online in ...

, ''The Guardian''). Since his introduction to the Lords, he has served as a Senior Whip. In 2012, he took on the role of Opposition Spokesman for Scotland and Northern Ireland. In May 2015, after the election of Angela Smith as Leader of the Opposition in the Lords, he took over as Opposition Deputy Chief Whip in

, serving with Denis Tunnicliffe. On 24 January 2018, he was elected Labour Chief Whip in the House of Lords and therefore Opposition Chief Whip, taking over from Steve Bassam. McAvoy was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) in the

2022 New Year Honours The 2022 New Year Honours are appointments by some of the 15 Commonwealth realms to various orders and honours to recognise and reward good works by citizens of those countries. The New Year Honours are awarded as part of the New Year celebrations ...

for political and public service.

Personal life

McAvoy and his wife Eleanor were married in 1968 in , Rutherglen, and had four sons. He was a school friend of

Bobby Murdoch Robert White Murdoch (17 August 1944 – 15 May 2001) was a Scottish professional footballer, who played for Celtic, Middlesbrough and Scotland. Murdoch was one of the Lisbon Lions, the Celtic team who won the European Cup in 1967. He later ...

, later a successful footballer with Celtic and

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

. His brother Eddie is a retired local politician who also worked at Hoover and subsequently served as the leader of

South Lanarkshire Council South Lanarkshire Council ( gd, Comhairle Siorrachd Lannraig a Deas) is the unitary authority serving the South Lanarkshire council area in Scotland. The council has its headquarters in Hamilton, has 16,000 employees, and a budget of almost £1b ...

from 1999 to 2017.South Lanarkshire Council leader Eddie McAvoy to stand down at next election
Daily Record, 30 June 2016

References

External links

Official Website
*

Tommy McAvoy MP
TheyWorkForYou.com
– Tommy McAvoy MP
BBC News Profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:McAvoy, Tommy 1943 births Living people Labour Co-operative life peers Life peers created by Elizabeth II People from Rutherglen Labour Co-operative MPs for Scottish constituencies Treasurers of the Household Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Glasgow constituencies UK MPs 1987–1992 UK MPs 1992–1997 UK MPs 1997–2001 UK MPs 2001–2005 UK MPs 2005–2010 Scottish Labour councillors Cambuslang Politicians from South Lanarkshire Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire Councillors in Glasgow