David Amess
From Free net encyclopedia
Current revision
David Anthony Andrew Amess (26 March, 1952) is a British politician. He is the current Conservative Member of Parliament for Southend West.
Contents |
Early life
He was born in Plaistow, London to James and Maud Ethel Amess, and raised a Roman Catholic. He attended St. Bonaventure Grammar School and then Bournemouth College of Technology, where he earned a degree with honours in Economics and government.
He taught at the St John the Baptist Primary School in Bethnal Green for a year, and spent a short time as an underwriter. He carved out a career as a recruitment consultant.
In 1983 he married Julia Monica Margaret Arnold. They have five children: one son and four daughters.
Political career
He contested the safe Labour Party seat of Newham North West at the 1979 General Election but the seat was retained by Labour's veteran MP Arthur Lewis very easily. In 1982, Amess was elected as a councillor to the London Borough of Redbridge.
The sitting Conservative MP for Basildon, Harvey Proctor, decided that his chances of holding his seat at the 1983 General Election were slim and migrated to the neighbouring seat of Billericay. Amess won the nomination to fight the Basildon seat and to some surprise he held the seat and was elected as Member of Parliament for Basildon on June 9, 1983.
Amess continued to serve both as a MP and a local councillor until 1986 when he stood down from Redbridge Borough Council to concentrate of his Westminster seat. He held his Basildon seat narrowly at the 1987 General Election. Following the election Amess was appointed a Parliamentary Private Secretary to Michael Portillo, a position he held for ten years throughout Portillo's ministerial career. Amess confounded everyone when he managed to hold his seat again at the 1992 General Election.
Amess was known for his ability to mention the town as often as possible during Parliamentary debates. Having represented the Essex town for 14 years it became clear that he could not win again there. Keen to continue in Parliament, Amess looked for a seat elsewhere.
At the other end of the county of Essex, the former Cabinet minister Paul Channon was retiring at Southend West. Amess got the nomination and despite the landslide Labour majority, he was returned to Westminster again. His former Basildon fell easily.
Positions
He is very loyal to Conservative party policy and almost never rebels in votes. However he is very strongly for the ban on fox-hunting. He voted for the 2003 invasion of Iraq but has since been critical of the government's failure to find the weapons of mass destruction with which they justified the action at the time. He is one of the few Conservative MPs to support the impeach Blair campaign and is strongly against Labour's proposed anti-terror laws and the erosion of civil liberties. He is in favour of a return to capital punishment, and this was reinforced after a family member was stabbed to death. Mr Amess is also a leading member of Conservative Friends of Israel.
Trivia
He appeared in the Drugs episode of Brass Eye in which he was fooled into filming an elaborate video warning against the dangers of a fictional Eastern European drug called Cake, and went as far as to ask a question about it in Parliament (the question was recorded in Hansard). To a lesser, but nonetheless deep humilation, he was also fooled into an interview with Mark Thomas on the very first episode of the Mark Thomas Comedy Product, where he drew a map of his constituency on a young woman's stomach, played noughts and crosses on it (pictured), and finally, after being shown pictures of David Martin doing the same, letting Mark (dressed as a giant bear) take pictures of his bottom.
- MT: "Coz you're pro-hanging, aren't you?"
- DA: "I am. [Pause] Well, no; I'm not not hanging."
- MT: "Shooting?"
- DA: "Er..er.. "
- MT: "Electrocution! Poison gas? Hitting? Stoning? Stone them! Stone them!"
- DA: "I'm sure there's a humane way of doing it."
He is a staunch right-wing traditionalist on law and order and ethical issues. He is a Catholic and speaks passionately on issues such as abortion and In Vitro Fertilisation.
In 2004, his son (David Jr.) was jailed for a serious assault.
External links
- ePolitix - David Amess official site
- Conservative Party - David Amess biography
- Guardian Unlimited Politics - Ask Aristotle: David Amess MP
- TheyWorkForYou - David Amess MP
Template:Start box
{{succession box
| title = MP for Basildon | years = 1983 – 1997 | before = Harvey Proctor | after = Angela Smith
}} {{incumbent succession box
| title = MP for Southend West | start = 1997 | before = Paul Channon