Willie Ross, Baron Ross of Marnock

The Right Honourable The Lord Ross of Marnock MBE PC
Ross giving a speech during his parliamentary career
Secretary of State for Scotland
In office 4 March 1974 – 8 April 1976
Prime Minister	Harold Wilson
Preceded by	Gordon Campbell
Succeeded by	Bruce Millan
In office 16 October 1964 – 19 June 1970
Prime Minister	Harold Wilson
Preceded by	Michael Noble
Succeeded by	Gordon Campbell
Shadow Secretary of State for Scotland
In office 19 June 1970 – 4 March 1974
Leader	Harold Wilson
Preceded by	Gordon Campbell
Succeeded by	Alick Buchanan-Smith
In office 7 December 1961 – 16 October 1964
Leader	Hugh Gaitskell Harold Wilson
Preceded by	Tom Fraser
Succeeded by	Michael Noble
Member of Parliament for Kilmarnock
In office 6 December 1946 – 7 April 1979
Preceded by	Clarice Shaw
Succeeded by	William McKelvey
Personal details
Born	(1911-04-07)7 April 1911 Ayr, Scotland, United Kingdom
Died	10 June 1988(1988-06-10) (aged 77) Ayr, Scotland, United Kingdom
Political party	Labour
Spouse	Elizabeth Aitkenhead
Children	2
Alma mater	University of Glasgow
Profession	Teacher

William Ross, Baron Ross of Marnock, MBE, PC (7 April 1911 – 10 June 1988) was the longest serving Secretary of State for Scotland, holding office from 1964–1970 and again from 1974–1976, throughout the premiership of Harold Wilson.

Early life and military career

Born in Ayr, the son of a train driver, he was educated at Ayr Academy and the University of Glasgow and became a schoolteacher before World War II. He served in the Highland Light Infantry in India, Burma and Singapore and was then a major in Lord Louis Mountbatten's headquarters in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). At one point he guarded Rudolf Hess. He became a Member of the Order of the British Empire in 1945.

Politics

After unsuccessfully contesting Ayr Burghs at the 1945 general election, Ross was elected Member of Parliament for Kilmarnock in a by-election in 1946. He was Parliamentary Private Secretary to Hector McNeil during his tenure as Secretary of State for Scotland and in 1954 placed an amendment to the bill on the licensing of commercial television, advocating a ban on adverts on Sundays, Good Friday and Christmas Day.

After serving as Shadow Secretary of State from 1962, he became Secretary of State for Scotland in 1964 under Harold Wilson. The Conservatives were in government from 1970 to 1974, when Ross resumed his position until he lost office when Wilson resigned in 1976. During his tenure, he was responsible for the creation of the Highlands and Islands Development Board and the Scottish Development Agency, the forerunners of Highlands and Islands Enterprise and Scottish Enterprise respectively. Ross campaigned for a "No" vote in the 1975 referendum on British membership of the EEC. He was also a firm unionist, in favour of Scotland and Northern Ireland remaining in the United Kingdom, and opposed devolution. Journalist Andrew Marr has called him "a stern-faced and authoritarian Presbyterian conservative who ran the country like a personal fiefdom for Harold Wilson". Ross coined the term "Tartan Tories" to describe the members of the Scottish National Party, whom he very much disliked; he was himself nicknamed "the hammer of the Nats" for his many attacks on them. The nickname "Tartan Tories" is still used in the present day by some left-leaning critics of the SNP.

He represented Kilmarnock until the 1979 general election, when he was created a life peer as Baron Ross of Marnock, of Kilmarnock in the District of Kilmarnock and Loudoun.

Ross was occasionally depicted by newspaper cartoonists as a boy in dungarees seated on an upturned bucket, as a reference to the Scottish cartoon character Oor Wullie.

He was Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland from 1978 to 1980, and became Honorary President of the Scottish Football Association in 1978. He married Elizabeth Jane Elma Aitkenhead, daughter of John Aitkenhead in 1948 and the couple had two daughters. He died of cancer in 1988. Lady Ross lived to the age of 94 and died in 2018.

References

• Torrance, David, The Scottish Secretaries (Birlinn 2006)
• Hughes, William (2004). "Ross, William, Baron Ross of Marnock (1911–1988)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/39856. Retrieved 28 February 2010. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by William Ross