John Peyton: Yeovil MP

Though John Peyton was born in Mayfair, in the heart of London, he became indelibly associated with Somerset and the West Country, including being MP for Yeovil for over 30 years.

After the Second World War, he entered politics as a Conservative. His first election was in a hopeless seat, the Labour stronghold of Bristol Central, where he was trounced in the 1950 general election.

By then living in Odcombe near Yeovil, he tried for two more winnable Somerset seats. At his preferred choice, Wells, his effort was a disaster: “faced with the selection committee, made an awful hash of things in a speech the end of which I seemed quite unable to find.” He had better luck at Yeovil, and was selected as its prospective Tory candidate. At the October 1951 election, he was easily elected. Appropriately, given Yeovil’s close military links at Westland and Yeovilton, he was made parliamentary private secretary to the junior Defence Minister.

He survived his maiden speech fairly well, speaking during the Budget debates on 13 March 1952. He recalled that the PM, Churchill, was present, “but after a few moments he turned towards me, with what then seemed a baleful, even hostile, stare, paused, rose to his feet and left the Chamber, leaving me to continue with a speech which I later realised was one of quite unusual dullness.”

Peyton was a diligent constituency MP, supporting, for example, the important but fragile gloving industry, with its crucial outworking base. He advocated tax reliefs for it, as in debates on the 1952 Finance Bill: “In my own constituency of Yeovil, and in other parts of the West Country, this old craft industry has been established for 400 years, and it would be so easy to deal it a blow from which recovery would be difficult, if not impossible.”

His ministerial career eventually took off in 1962, when the PM, Harold Macmillan, gave him a junior post at the Ministry of Power. But when the Tories were defeated in the 1964 general election, he became a backbencher, and gained a reputation for mercilessly taunting the new PM, Harold Wilson, over the 1967 devaluation.

In 1969, he chaired a party committee to develop a West Country strategy for the forthcoming general election. It recommended that the key was better communications, especially transport links. It may have been this which led to being made Minister of Transport in June 1970, after the Tories’ surprise election victory. He retained this job, under various titles, through the whole Heath Government.

Peyton endured the routine of administration, once grumbling: “All I have to do all day is study bloody maps.” However, he handled some high-profile and controversial policies, such as the original Treaty for a Channel Tunnel, compulsory fitting (though not yet the wearing) of front seatbelts, and compulsory helmets for motorcyclists. This last policy provoked a provocative anti-Peyton poster in Yeovil at the first 1974 general election.

When the Tories lost the February 1974 election, Peyton concentrated on his business interests, but accepted Heath’s offer, after the second 1974 election defeat, to become Shadow Leader of the House of Commons. He retained this Opposition post even after Margaret Thatcher won the 1975 Tory leadership election, in which Peyton had unwisely stood in the second ballot, garnering a derisory 11 votes. In 1976, Thatcher moved him to Shadow Agriculture Minister.

Following Thatcher’s 1979 election victory, Peyton was furious at being the only senior Shadow Minister not to be given a Government post. She offered him a peerage as consolation, which he rejected, as he had just told his constituents during the campaign that he wanted to continue to be their MP. When she then offered the peerage after the next election, Peyton made her put this offer in writing. In a meeting to finalise this agreement, Peyton was blunt with the new PM, saying how hurt and angry he was with her, but that he would not seek revenge.

As agreed, he retired at the 1983 election, and became Baron Peyton of Yeovil. As a biographer reported, “In retirement he remained a highly regarded figure in his former constituency and could often be seen walking near his home in Hinton St George, wearing a distinctive black beret.” In 1997, his autobiography, Without benefit of laundry, was published.

Though he died in London hospital in November 2006, he was buried at the Church in Hinton St George, where his gravestone can be seen. In the church there is a memorial glass screen, engraved “In memory of John Peyton, MP for Yeovil 1951-1983.”

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