Lawrence William Quinn (born 25 December 1956) is a British Labour Party politician,

railway engineer Railway engineering is a multi-faceted engineering discipline dealing with the design, construction and operation of all types of rail transport systems. It encompasses a wide range of engineering disciplines, including civil engineering, compu ...

and from

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; '' Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of ...

to 2005 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 o ...

for Scarborough and Whitby.

Early life and education

Quinn was born in Harraby, a suburb of Carlisle, then in Cumberland. He attended Pennine Way Primary School and North Cumbria Technology College (then known as Harraby Comprehensive School) Harraby Comprehensive School. In 1979, at

Hatfield Polytechnic The University of Hertfordshire (UH) is a public university in Hertfordshire, United Kingdom. The university is based largely in Hatfield, Hertfordshire. Its antecedent institution, Hatfield Technical College, was founded in 1948 and was iden ...

, he gained a

BSc A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University ...

civil engineering Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads, bridges, canals, dams, airports, sewa ...

. Prior to his election to Parliament, he was a civil engineer with British Rail (1979–94) and

Railtrack Railtrack was a group of companies that owned the track, signalling, tunnels, bridges, level crossings and all but a handful of the stations of the British railway system from 1994 until 2002. It was created as part of the privatisation of ...

London North-East (1994-7), and a member of North Yorkshire County Council from 1989 to 1993.

Parliamentary career

From 1989 to 1993, Quinn was a

Councillor A councillor is an elected representative for a local government council in some countries. Canada Due to the control that the provinces have over their municipal governments, terms that councillors serve vary from province to province. Unl ...

North Yorkshire County Council North Yorkshire County Council (NYCC) is the county council governing the non-metropolitan county of North Yorkshire; an area composing most of North Yorkshire in England. The council currently consists of 90 councillors. The council is current ...

, serving on the Highways Committee, the Policy and Resources Committee and the Planning Committee. He was unexpectedly elected to Parliament in the 1997 General Election as

for Scarborough and Whitby, as part of the Labour landslide election victory while he was not really expecting to win a normally

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

seat which he retained in the 2001 General Election. He sat for two terms until being ousted by Conservative candidate

Robert Goodwill Sir Robert Goodwill (born 31 December 1956) is a British Conservative Party politician and farmer serving as Member of Parliament (MP) for Scarborough and Whitby since 2005. He was previously a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for York ...

in the

United Kingdom general election This is a list of United Kingdom general elections (elections for the UK House of Commons) since the first in 1802. The members of the 1801–1802 Parliament had been elected to the former Parliament of Great Britain and Parliament of Ireland ...

of 2005. Lawrie lost the seat by 1,245 votes. It has been suggested that votes for the local

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 ...

candidate, the Iraq war, and negative feeling towards

Tony Blair Sir Anthony Charles Lynton Blair (born 6 May 1953) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007. He previously served as Leader of th ...

(who visited Scarborough the day before polling day to consolidate support) resulted in the marginal loss. Quinn is a member of the

Fabian Society The Fabian Society is a British socialist organisation whose purpose is to advance the principles of social democracy and democratic socialism via gradualist and reformist effort in democracies, rather than by revolutionary overthrow. T ...

. Since losing his seat he has returned to engineering, working as Tube Lines New Works Delivery Manager on secondment from Bechtel (2005 until 2007) then as the Rail Projects Delivery Manager for Bechtel based in London.

Personal life

He married Ann Christine Eames in 1982.

References

External links

Official Website

They Work For You
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Quinn, Lawrie 1956 births Living people Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies UK MPs 1997–2001 UK MPs 2001–2005 People from Carlisle, Cumbria Alumni of the University of Hertfordshire Members of North Yorkshire County Council