John Sewel, Baron Sewel

The Lord Sewel
Chairman of Committees
In office
9 May 2012 – 26 July 2015
Lord SpeakerThe Baroness D'Souza
Preceded byThe Lord Brabazon of Tara
Succeeded byThe Lord Laming
Member of the House of Lords
Lord Temporal
In office
10 January 1996 – 28 July 2015
Life peerage
Personal details
Born
John Buttifant Sewel

(1946-01-15) 15 January 1946 (age 78)
NationalityBritish
Political party
Spouses
Rosemary Langeland
(m. 1968⁠–⁠1986)
Leonora Harding
(m. 1988⁠–⁠2002)
Jennifer Lindsay
(m. 2005)
[2]
Children2
Alma materDurham University
University College of Wales, Swansea
University of Aberdeen

John Buttifant Sewel, Baron Sewel, CBE (/ˈswəl/; born 15 January 1946), is a British politician, life peer, and former academic. He served as Chairman of Committees of the House of Lords, its deputy speaker. He is also a former senior vice principal of the University of Aberdeen and a former parliamentary under-secretary of state.

He was made a Labour minister in the Scottish Office department of the Blair Government as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland in 1997, where he assisted Donald Dewar in steering through the legislation that led to the creation of the Scottish Parliament. His name is given to the Sewel motion, parliamentary device passed by the Scottish Parliament, in which it agrees that the United Kingdom parliament may pass legislation on a devolved issue extending to Scotland, over which the Scottish Parliament has regular legislative authority. He left ministerial office in 1999 upon the new Parliament taking over the majority of the Scottish Office's functions. Sewel left the House of Lords in 2015 after photos of him doing drugs with prositutes emerged.[3]

  1. ^ Mortimer, Caroline (27 July 2015). "Lord Sewel to 'tough it out' despite suspension from Labour". The Independent. Archived from the original on 13 June 2022. Retrieved 27 July 2015.
  2. ^ Hebditch, Jon (27 July 2015). "North-east politician caught snorting cocaine with prostitutes". The Press and Journal. Aberdeen. Retrieved 28 July 2015.
  3. ^ "British Pol Resigns After Cocaine and Prostitutes Video | Time". 26 July 2015.