David Lipsey, Baron Lipsey
The Lord Lipsey | |
|---|---|
 Official portrait, 2023 | |
| Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal | |
| In office 30 July 1999 – 1 July 2025 Life Peerage | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | David Lawrence Lipsey 21 April 1948 |
| Died | 1 July 2025 (aged 77) Glasbury, Powys, Wales |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party | Labour |
| Alma mater | Bryanston School Magdalen College, Oxford |
| Occupation | Journalist and politician |
 |
David Lawrence Lipsey, Baron Lipsey (21 April 1948 – 1 July 2025) was a British journalist and Labour Party politician.
Life and career
[edit]Lipsey was privately educated at Bryanston School, Dorset (1962–67),[1][2] and later studied Politics, Philosophy and Economics (PPE) at Magdalen College, Oxford in 1968 and graduated with a First-Class degree, winning the university's Gibbs Prize in Politics in 1969.[citation needed]
From 1970 to 1972 he was secretary of the Streatham Labour Party.[citation needed]
He went on to become a political adviser to Anthony Crosland in Opposition and an adviser to 10 Downing Street. He was responsible for the coinage of the name "New Labour" and the phrase "Winter of Discontent" applied to the period of British politics between September 1978 and February 1979.[3][4]
From 1982 to 1983, he was chairman of the Fabian Society.[citation needed]
He worked as a journalist for a variety of different publications including the Sunday Times, Sunday Correspondent, The Times, The Guardian and The Economist. He was awarded a Special Orwell Prize in 1997 for his work as 'Bagehot' in The Economist.[5]
Lipsey was created a life peer as Baron Lipsey, of Tooting Bec in the London Borough of Wandsworth, on 30 July 1999.[6] He sat on the Labour benches in the House of Lords. Lipsey held numerous senior posts in public life. As well as his economic and social interests, he chaired the All-Party Parliamentary group on Classical Music (from 2011), was a patron of the Glasbury Arts Festival, a trustee of the Cambrian Orchestra Trust and chairman of the Sidney Nolan Trust (from 2011), as well as a trustee of other arts organisations.[7]
Lipsey was a fan of harness racing and greyhound racing. He was president of the British Harness Racing Club from 2008 to 2016.[citation needed] He was a longtime member of the All-Party Parliamentary Greyhound Group, which owned a number of greyhounds including Division Bell and Go Running Whip.[8][9] He was also chair of the British Greyhound Racing Board from 2004 to 2009 (before it became the Greyhound Board of Great Britain).[7]
Lipsey died on 1 July 2025, at the age of 77,[10] while swimming in the River Wye in Glasbury, Powys.[3]
References
[edit]- ^ "Online autobiography". www.davidlipsey.co.uk. Archived from the original on 13 April 2019. Retrieved 5 January 2019.
- ^ Lipsey, David (2012). In the Corridors of Power: An Autobiography. London: Biteback Publishing. ISBN 9781849544290. Retrieved 6 August 2019.
- ^ a b Buckland, Charlie (3 July 2025). "Labour peer dies while swimming in river". BBC News. Retrieved 3 July 2025.
- ^ Travis, Alan (30 December 2008). "I'll fix it, Callaghan wrote – then came the winter of discontent". The Guardian. Retrieved 7 July 2025.
In a Downing Street note on 5 October 1978, [Lipsey] posed the question: 'Could we win an election after a winter of discontent in which a large chunk of the PLP [Parliamentary Labour party] will be sympathising with the malcontents?'
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ "1997 Special Prize Winner". The Orwell Foundation. Archived from the original on 27 September 2022. Retrieved 7 July 2025.
- ^ "No. 55572". The London Gazette. 4 August 1999. p. 8409.
- ^ a b "Lord Lipsey". UK Parliament. Retrieved 1 February 2017.
- ^ Brown, Paul (4 July 2025). "'A tremendous ambassador for greyhound racing' - tributes paid to Lord Lipsey following death aged 77". Racing Post. Spotlight Sports Group. Retrieved 7 July 2025.
- ^ Lord Bilston (28 June 2007). "Sport". Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). Parliament of the United Kingdom: House of Lords. col. 754.
- ^ "Lipsey, Lord David". International Year Book and Statesmen's Who's Who. Retrieved 2 July 2025.
Sources
[edit]- http://biographies.parliament.uk/parliament/default.asp?id=26939 Archived 23 April 2010 at the Wayback Machine
- https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/people/mr-david-lipsey/index.html
- http://lordsoftheblog.wordpress.com/the-authors/
- https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1351595/Life-in-the-Lords-is-too-tough-says-Labour-peer.html
- Catalogue of the Lipsey papers held at LSE Archives
