List Of Stewards Of The Chiltern Hundreds
Appointment to the position of Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds is a procedural device to allow Members of Parliament to resign from the House of Commons of the United Kingdom. Members of the House of Commons are technically forbidden from resigning. To circumvent this prohibition, a legal fiction is used. An appointment to an "office of profit under The Crown" disqualifies an individual from sitting as a Member of Parliament (MP). As such, several such positions are maintained to allow MPs to resign. Currently, the positions of Steward of the Manor of Northstead and Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds are used; historically several other offices have also been used. The position was reworked in 1861 by William Ewart Gladstone, who was worried about the honour conferred by appointment to people such as Edwin James, who had fled to the United States over £10,000 in debt. As such, the letter was rewritten to omit any references to honour.
The Parliamentary Information Office has produced a list of those appointed to the office of Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds since 1850. The current office holder is Denis MacShane, former Labour Party Member of Parliament for Rotherham, who was appointed to the office of Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds on 5 November 2012.
Appointees to the offices of Steward of the Manor of Northstead and Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds are alternated so that two MPs can resign at once (as happened on 22 October 2012). In situations in which more than two resign, such as the 1985 walkout of Ulster Unionist MPs, appointees are "fired" after a few hours to allow other resigning MPs to take their place.
Read more about List Of Stewards Of The Chiltern Hundreds: Key, 1751 To 1800, 1801 To 1849, 1850 To 1899, 1900 To 1999, 2000 To Present
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