| Richard Acland |
Article Index for Richard |
Website Links For Richard |
Information AboutRichard Acland |
|
Acland was the son of Sir Francis Acland , a Liberal MP. He was educated at Rugby School and Balliol College, Oxford and became a barrister and architect. He served as a lieutenant in the Royal North Devon Yeomanry . Acland stood for Parliament without success for Torquay was elected Liberal Member Of Parliament for Barnstaple in 1935, having first contested the seat in 1931. He was a junior Whip for the Liberals. His politics changed course subsequently, as seen in the various pamphlets he wrote, and in 1942 he broke from the Liberals to found the socialist Common Wealth Party with J B Priestley , opposing the coalition between the major parties. He advocated public land ownership and donated his West Country estate at Killerton , Devon to the National Trust . Although the Common Wealth Party had shown signs during World War II of a breakthrough, especially in London and Merseyside , the 1945 General Election was a severe disappointment. Only one Member of Parliament was elected and other figures had left or joined the Labour Party. Acland himself lost in Putney , where he came third. He joined Labour and was selected to fight Gravesend at a 1947 by-election, which he won. Back in Parliament, Acland served as Second Church Estates Commissioner 1950–51. In 1955, he resigned from Labour in protest against the party's support for the Conservative government's nuclear defence policy, and lost Gravesend as an independent the same year, allowing the Conservatives to take the seat from the official Labour candidate, Victor Mishcon . He helped form the Campaign For Nuclear Disarmament (CND) in 1957 and was senior lecturer at St. Luke’s College Of Education . Acland was married to Anne Stella Alford, an architect, with whom he had four sons. He succeeded his father as Baronet in 1939. |
|
|