Peter Bottomley - Member of Parliament

Member of Parliament

Bottomley contested the Woolwich West parliamentary seat in the February 1974 General Election and in October failing to defeat the sitting Labour MP William Hamling. William Hamling died on 20 March 1975, and in the space of 18 months, Bottomley faced the electors of Woolwich West for the third time at the June by-election in the last year Harold Wilson led the Labour government. Peter Bottomley was elected as the Conservative MP for Woolwich West on 26 June 1975 with a majority of 2,382, and held this marginal seat and its successor, Eltham, in Parliament for the next 22 years. Margaret Thatcher was apparently surprised to be told by him that Ian Smith in Rhodesia was morally wrong, a military loser in the longer term and on either count should be told he would not have Conservative support.

In 1978 he became the President of the Conservative Trade Unionists, a position he held for two years. Before the 1979 General Election, Peter Bottomley became a trustee with Christian Aid in 1978 until 1984. In 1978 as member of the Parliamentary Human Rights Group, he campaigned to help delay the anticipated assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero and represented the British Council of Churches at the funeral in El Salvador in 1980 when 14 people died around him. In 1979, he made a visit to Washington DC days before the defeat of the Vote of Confidence in 1979 to help persuade the United States Senate that Margaret Thatcher if Prime Minister would not lift sanctions on Southern Rhodesia nor would recognise the government of Bishop Abel Muzorewa. He was for some years a member of the Conservative Monday Club despite disagreeing with their policies on immigration, race relations, Rhodesia and South Africa. He has been chairman of the Church of England's Children's Society, a trustee of Mind and of Nacro and on the policy committee of One Parent Families. He served on the successor committee to the Archbishop of Canterbury's commission Faith in the City and chaired the churches' review group on the Churches Main Committee. He is a member of the Ecclesiastical Committee and has been appointed the Parliamentary Warden at St. Margaret's Church, Westminster. He is leader of the United Kingdom delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).

In 1982, he became the Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to the Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Cranley Onslow in 1982. Peter Bottomley's seat of Woolwich West had minor boundary changes and a name change. Bottomley fought the new seat of Eltham which he won by over 7,500 votes. Following the 1983 General Election, Peter Bottomley became the PPS to the Secretary of State at the Department of Health and Social Security Norman Fowler.