Tudor Watkins, Baron Watkins

The Right Honourable The Lord Watkins
Member of Parliament for Brecon and Radnorshire
In office 1945 – 18 June 1970
Preceded by	William Jackson
Succeeded by	Caerwyn Roderick
Personal details
Born	(1903-05-09)9 May 1903
Died	2 November 1983(1983-11-02) (aged 80)
Nationality	British
Political party	Labour

Tudor Elwyn Watkins, Baron Watkins (9 May 1903 – 2 November 1983) was a Welsh Labour Party politician.

Background

Tablet at the Brecon Beacons Mountain Centre with references to Cledwyn Hughes and Tudor Watkins

Watkins was born at Abercrave on 9 May 1903. He worked as a miner from 1917 until 1925, served as a Labour Party constituency agent in Brecon and Radnorshire from 1925 until 1933, and was the general secretary to the Breconshire Association of Friendly Societies from 1937 until 1948.

Service in Parliament

He was a Labour Member of Parliament for Brecon and Radnorshire from 1945, winning all succeeding elections (including two consecutive defeats, in 1950 and 1951, of David Gibson-Watt) until his retirement at the 1970 general election. He strongly supported the Parliament for Wales campaign in the early 1950s, and was also a supporter of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. He visited the Soviet Union in 1961, and Patagonia in 1965.

He is also credited with preserving the only known population of the lesser whitebeam (sorbus minima) which was endangered in 1947 by British Army mortar practice in and around its habitat, by raising the issue in the Commons, and inducing War Secretary Frederick Bellenger to order the Army to pull out of the area.

After retiring from the House of Commons he was created a life peer on 10 May 1972 as Baron Watkins, of Glyntawe in the County of Brecknock.

Death and legacy

Lord and Lady Watkins' grave at St David's Church, Llanfaes, Brecon

Lord Watkins died on 2 November 1983. He was cremated and his ashes buried in the churchyard of St David's Church, Llanfaes, Brecon. His wife's ashes are also buried there. His papers are in the holdings of the National Library of Wales.

Sources

Books and journals

• Jones, J. Graham (December 1992). "The Parliament for Wales campaign, 1950-1956" (PDF). Welsh History Review. 16 (2): 207–36. Retrieved 15 April 2016.
• Leigh Rayment's Peerage Pages
• Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Tudor Watkins