Woodrow Lyle Wyatt, Baron Wyatt of Weeford (July 4, 1918 – December 7, 1997), was a British Labour politician, published author, journalist and broadcaster.

Wyatt was educated at Eastbourne College and Worcester College, Oxford. He served throughout the Second World War and rose to the rank of Major. He was mentioned in despatches from Normandy.

He was elected to Parliament for Birmingham Aston in 1945 which he served until 1955. He returned to Parliament in 1959 as member for Bosworth, Leicestershire. Wyatt was briefly a junior minister in Clement Atlee’s final administration in 1951 but thereafter was never in office. He was seen by some as a maverick, and by others as a man of firm convictions which made him temperamentally unsuited to “toeing the party line”. He rebelled in the 1964–1970 parliaments over steel nationalisation.

After ceasing to be an active politician he was Chairman of the Horserace Totaliser Board from 1976–1997. He was a prolific journalist, with a diverse range of interests. By now he had crossed the political spectrum and was an unabashed admirer of Margaret Thatcher, though his News of the World column 'The Voice of Reason', was regularly mocked by liberal opinion formers. His caustic, candid and mischievously indiscreet diaries were published posthumously in three volumes. He became a Life Peer in 1987.

The journalist Petronella Wyatt is his daughter and in 2000 she wrote a book entitled Father, Dear Father: Life with Woodrow Wyatt (ISBN 0099297604) which is an "affectionate portrait of the last great English eccentric" and has many personal and historically significant anecdotes ^*.

Wyatt was married four times, including to:

• Third (1957): Lady Moorea Hastings (dissolved 1966)
• Fourth (1966): Veronica (Verushka) Banszky Von Ambroz

External link

• Lord Wyatt dies aged 79 - BBC News December 9, 1997

1918 births | 1997 deaths | English journalists | Life peers | Members of the United Kingdom Parliament from English constituencies | UK Labour Party politicians