George Brown, Baron George-Brown

The Right Honourable The Lord George-Brown PC
Brown in 1967
Foreign Secretary
In office 11 August 1966 – 15 March 1968
Prime Minister	Harold Wilson
Preceded by	Michael Stewart
Succeeded by	Michael Stewart
First Secretary of State
In office 16 October 1964 – 11 August 1966
Prime Minister	Harold Wilson
Preceded by	Rab Butler (1963)[a]
Succeeded by	Michael Stewart
Secretary of State for Economic Affairs
In office 16 October 1964 – 11 August 1966
Prime Minister	Harold Wilson
Preceded by	Office created
Succeeded by	Michael Stewart
Deputy Leader of the Labour Party
In office 15 July 1960 – 19 June 1970
Leader	Hugh Gaitskell Harold Wilson
Preceded by	Aneurin Bevan
Succeeded by	Roy Jenkins
Leader of the Opposition
In office 18 January 1963 – 14 February 1963
Monarch	Elizabeth II
Prime Minister	Harold Macmillan
Preceded by	Hugh Gaitskell
Succeeded by	Harold Wilson
Minister of Works
In office 26 April 1951 – 26 October 1951
Prime Minister	Clement Attlee
Preceded by	Richard Stokes
Succeeded by	David Eccles
Member of Parliament for Belper
In office 5 July 1945 – 29 May 1970
Preceded by	Herbert Wragg
Succeeded by	Geoffrey Stewart-Smith
Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal
In office 10 November 1970 – 2 June 1985 Life peerage
Personal details
Born	George Alfred Brown (1914-09-02)2 September 1914 Lambeth, London, England
Died	2 June 1985(1985-06-02) (aged 70) Truro, Cornwall, England
Political party	Labour (until 1976) SDP (1985)[1]
Spouse	Sophie Levene ​ ​ (m. 1937; sep. 1982)​
Children	2
a. ^ Office vacant from 18 October 1963 to 16 October 1964.

George Alfred George-Brown, Baron George-Brown,^[2] PC (né Brown; 2 September 1914 – 2 June 1985), was a British Labour Party politician who was Deputy Leader of the Labour Party from 1960 to 1970 and held several Cabinet roles under Prime Minister Harold Wilson, including Foreign Secretary and First Secretary of State.

After leaving school at the age of 15, Brown began work as a clerk, before joining the Transport and General Workers' Union. He rose quickly through the union ranks as an organiser, and shortly before the 1945 election he was chosen as the Labour Party candidate for the seat of Belper. He defeated the Conservative incumbent and went on to hold the seat until his own defeat at the 1970 election. He briefly served in the Attlee government as Minister of Works in 1951. After Labour lost office he was appointed to the Shadow Cabinet, and came to be regarded as a leader of the trade-union-supporting faction on the right of the Labour Party. Following the sudden death of Aneurin Bevan in 1960, Brown was successful in the election to replace him as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party.

Three years later, following the sudden death of Hugh Gaitskell, Brown became Acting Leader of the Labour Party, and consequently was briefly Leader of the Opposition. He stood in the election to gain the role permanently, but was beaten by Harold Wilson; one factor in his defeat was concern from colleagues about the impact of his well-known alcoholism, an affliction that remained with him through his life.^[3] Following Labour's victory at the 1964 election, Wilson appointed Brown as First Secretary of State, making him the next-most senior member of the Cabinet, and appointed him to the new position of Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to curtail the power of HM Treasury.

Two months after Labour's landslide victory at the snap 1966 election, Wilson moved Brown to the role of Foreign Secretary, a job he had always coveted. Despite this, Brown continued to struggle with his alcoholism, and after several arguments with Wilson in 1968, the two agreed that Brown would resign. Brown lost his seat of Belper in 1970, and shortly thereafter was elevated to the House of Lords; he insisted, having always been known simply as "George Brown", that upon taking his peerage in November 1970 he would combine his first name and surname to create his title, Baron George-Brown, of Jevington in the County of Sussex.^[1]