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Tory MP set out to 'nurse' the town

15/12/2007

THIS weekend marks a significant historical milestone for the Rochdale political scene.

For it was 50 years ago tomorrow, on 16 December 1957, that the town’s last Conservative MP died.

Ever since Rochdalians have either elected Labour MPs or Liberals to Westminster.

Lieutenant Colonel Wentworth Schofield was 66 years old and had been Rochdale’s MP since October 1951.

His sudden death – in a hospital in Southport after a relatively minor operation on an inflamed gall bladder – came as a shock to most townspeople, none more so than his second wife, Olga, whom he had married only a month before.

His death brought about an extraordinary by-election where live television was used for the first time in this country, mainly because one of the candidates, the Liberal Ludovic Kennedy was a well known broadcaster and writer and married to the ballet dancer, Moira Shearer.

It was an election that saw Labour’s Jack McCann elected with 22,000 votes, 12,000 more than the Tory candidate, John Parkinson, and 5,000 more than Mr Kennedy.

Lieut Col Schofield had been adopted as the prospective Conservative candidate for Rochdale in 1947, immediately setting out to ‘nurse’ the constituency, eventually achieving notable success.

At the first election he fought in 1950 he polled 21,280 votes against Labour Joseph Hale’s 25,484, with the Liberal nominee Roger Fulford trailing behind in third place with 10,042 votes. But in October 1951 Lieut Col Schofield defeated Mr Hale by a narrow margin to become the town’s first Tory MP since 1931.

He earned the respect of members of all parties as forceful yet pleasant personality with unbounded energy for the welfare of his constituents.

He was recognised as an authority on the cotton trade – Rochdale being a major cotton town at that time – and before the Second World War had played a prominent part in negotiations which ultimately led to the spinners' price agreements and he became secretary of the Yarn Spinners' Association.

He was also one of two Government representatives on the Empire Cotton Growing Association.

His military record was also honourable. For 33 years he was on the active list of the Territorial Army. He had served as an infantryman in the First World War and in 1939 formed the 47th battalion of the Royal Tank Regiment, which he commanded for three years until he was transferred to the 34th Tank Brigade in time for the Normandy landings.

As a private citizen he never sought to exploit his military rank, even appealing to electors in election material as plain Mr Schofield.

But when he became an MP Hansard referred him by his military title and from then on the Rochdale Observer did likewise, even though he did not wish to make capital out of it himself.