William Lyle (30 March 1871 – 2 August 1949) was a

Northern Irish Northern Irish people is a demonym for all people born in Northern Ireland or people who are entitled to reside in Northern Ireland without any restriction on their period of residence. Most Northern Irish people either identify as Northern ...

medical doctor and

Ulster Unionist Party The Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) is a unionist political party in Northern Ireland. The party was founded in 1905, emerging from the Irish Unionist Alliance in Ulster. Under Edward Carson, it led unionist opposition to the Irish Home Rule movem ...

politician. He sat in the

House of Commons of Northern Ireland The House of Commons of Northern Ireland was the lower house of the Parliament of Northern Ireland created under the ''Government of Ireland Act 1920''. The upper house in the bicameral parliament was called the Senate. It was abolished wit ...

for a few years in his 70s.

Career

Lyle was a graduate of

Queen's University Belfast , mottoeng = For so much, what shall we give back? , top_free_label = , top_free = , top_free_label1 = , top_free1 = , top_free_label2 = , top_free2 = , established = , closed = , type = Public research university , parent = ...

who became a medical Officer for

Newtownstewart Newtownstewart is a village and townland of in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It is overlooked by hills called Bessy Bell and Mary Gray and lies on the River Strule below the confluence with its tributary the Owenkillew. It is situated in th ...

County Tyrone County Tyrone (; ) is one of the six Counties of Northern Ireland, counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the thirty-two traditional Counties of Ireland, counties of Ireland. It is no longer used as an admini ...

. A member of

Tyrone County Council Tyrone County Council was the authority responsible for local government in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. History Tyrone County Council was formed under orders issued in accordance with the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898 which came into ef ...

, he stood as the Ulster Unionist candidate at a by-election on 19 October 1942 for the Queen's University of Belfast constituency, and was elected unopposed. He was sworn in on 27 October 1942. On 15 December 1942, the Commons debated a motion proposed by Lyle for the creation of a dedicated Ministry of Health, in view of the sweeping changes needed to implement the recently-published

Beveridge Report The Beveridge Report, officially entitled ''Social Insurance and Allied Services'' ( Cmd. 6404), is a government report, published in November 1942, influential in the founding of the welfare state in the United Kingdom. It was drafted by the Libe ...

. He used the debate to attack the

Minister of Home Affairs An interior minister (sometimes called a minister of internal affairs or minister of home affairs) is a cabinet official position that is responsible for internal affairs, such as public security, civil registration and identification, emergency ...

Dawson Bates Sir Richard Dawson Bates, 1st Baronet (23 November 1876 – 10 June 1949), known as Dawson Bates, was an Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) member of the House of Commons of Northern Ireland. He was born in Strandtown, Belfast, the son of Richard D ...

, whose brief included health. Bates had held the office since the foundation of Northern Ireland 21 years earlier, but Northern Ireland had seen no new

public health Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the det ...

legislation since 1878. Lyle accused the minister of repeatedly setting up committees on public health issues, but then not acting on their reports. Lyle's enthusiasm for public health measures did not extend to public housing. The Housing Act (Northern Ireland) 1945 established the

Northern Ireland Housing Trust The Northern Ireland Housing Trust was a public authority which provided public housing in Northern Ireland from 1945 until 1971, when its functions were merged into the newly created Northern Ireland Housing Executive. The Northern Ireland Housi ...

, which built some 48,500 homes between 1945 and 1971. During the November 1944 debates on the Housing (No. 2) Bill which later became the Act, Lyle both opposed the proposed centralisation and the emphasis on public housing, rather than private. He blamed it on the influence in government of

Harry Midgley Henry Cassidy Midgley, PC (NI), known as Harry Midgley (1893 – 29 April 1957) was a prominent trade-unionist and politician in Northern Ireland. Born to a working-class Protestant family in Tiger's Bay, north Belfast, he followed his father into ...

, the

Minister of Labour Minister of Labour (in British English) or Labor (in American English) is typically a cabinet-level position with portfolio responsibility for setting national labour standards, labour dispute mechanisms, employment, workforce participation, traini ...

. Midgley was a popular Belfast labour politician who had been brought into the Cabinet by Basil Brooke, but Lyle said of the 52-year-old Midgley:

"some of his views are abhorrent to me, especially this one of nationalisation. I hope that as he grows older, more mellow, more mature, and gets rather more commonsense than he has at present he will drop those obnoxious views".

Lyle was defeated at the

1945 general election The following elections occurred in the year 1945. Africa * 1945 South-West African legislative election Asia * 1945 Indian general election Australia * 1945 Fremantle by-election Europe * 1945 Albanian parliamentary election * 1945 Bulgaria ...

. In the 4-seat

single transferable vote Single transferable vote (STV) is a multi-winner electoral system in which voters cast a single vote in the form of a ranked-choice ballot. Voters have the option to rank candidates, and their vote may be transferred according to alternate p ...

constituency, he polled in sixth place less with than 10% of the first preference votes. However at the general election in February 1949, his slightly increased 11.2% of first preferences was enough to win him the fourth seat. He held that seat until his death 6 months later, on 2 August 1949, at the age of 78.

References

Sources

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lyle, William 1871 births 1949 deaths Alumni of Queen's University Belfast People from Newtownstewart Ulster Unionist Party members of the House of Commons of Northern Ireland Members of the House of Commons of Northern Ireland 1938–1945 Members of the House of Commons of Northern Ireland 1949–1953 Members of Tyrone County Council Members of the House of Commons of Northern Ireland for Queen's University of Belfast Place of birth missing Ulster Unionist Party councillors Medical doctors from County Tyrone