Terry Davis (politician)

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Terence Anthony Gordon Davis (born 5 January 1938), known as Terry Davis, is a British Labour Party politician, and former Member of Parliament for the Birmingham Hodge Hill constituency, and current Secretary General of the Council of Europe. He is a member of the Privy Council.

At the 1970 general election, Davis stood unuccessfuly in the Conservative-held Bromsgrove constituency. However the sitting MP, James Dance, died the following year, and Davis won the resulting by-election.

The Bromsgrove constituency was abolished in boundary changes for the February 1974 general election, and in the new Bromsgrove and Redditch constituency, Davis lost to the Conservative Hal Miller. He stood again at the October 1974 general election and lost again.

In 1977, Birmingham Stechford Labour MP, Roy Jenkins, was appointed as President of the European Commission, and Davis was selected as the Labour candidate in the by-election. He lost by 1,949 votes to the Conservative Andrew MacKay, but at the 1979 general election, he retook the seat with a majority of 1,649.

The Stechford constituency was abolished in boundary changes for the 1983 general election, and Davis was re-elected in the succesor constituency of Birmingham Hodge Hill. He held that seat until his retirement from the House of Commons 21 years later.

In June 2004 he was elected Secretary General of the Council of Europe and announced his intention to stand down from the UK parliament, by applying for the Stewardship of the Chiltern Hundreds. The resulting by-election was held on July 15 and won by Labour's Liam Byrne.

Mr. Davis is a graduate of the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business

[edit] References

This page incorporates information from Leigh Rayment's Peerage Page.

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by James Dance	Member of Parliament for Bromsgrove 1971–1974	Succeeded by (constituency abolished)
Preceded by Andrew MacKay	Member of Parliament for Birmingham Stechford 1979–1983	Succeeded by (constituency abolished)
Preceded by (new constituency)	Member of Parliament for Birmingham Hodge Hill 1983–2004	Succeeded by Liam Byrne