Richard Edwards (Welsh politician)
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Richard Edwards | |
|---|---|
 Edwards in 2000 | |
| Member of the Welsh Assembly for Preseli Pembrokeshire | |
| In office 6 May 1999 – 1 May 2003 | |
| Preceded by | New Assembly |
| Succeeded by | Tamsin Dunwoody |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 25 August 1956 |
| Party | Labour |
| Alma mater | University of Birmingham |
Richard Edwards (born 25 August 1956 in Llanelli)[1] is a former Welsh Labour politician who was a Member of the National Assembly for Wales for Preseli Pembrokeshire from 1999 to 2003. Before politics he worked in local government and was a political researcher.
He was educated at Queen Elizabeth Grammar School, Carmarthen, and gained a BA, MA and a PhD in philosophy from the University of Birmingham.[1][2] He also attended Swansea University.[2] He is a member of the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators and a member of the Unison trade union.
He is a cousin of the former BBC Newsreader Huw Edwards.[3]
Career
He worked as a researcher and election agent for Alan Williams MP.[1]
Local Government
Edwards worked as an Officer at the London Borough of Hounslow from 1979 to 1981 and as a researcher and lecturer at the Institute for Local Government studies from 1981 to 1985.[1]
He was Mayor of Carmarthen in 1997,[4] having first been elected to Carmarthen Town Council in 1991.[2]
National Assembly for Wales
He was elected as Member of the National Assembly for Wales for Preseli Pembrokeshire at the 1999 Welsh assembly election in a divided election, receiving just over a third of the vote.[5] He was initially selected to chair the assembly Local Government and Environment Committee, before committees were changed in March 2000, from which point on he chaired the Environment, Planning and Transport Committee.[6]
In November 2001, he announced his intention to stand down from the Welsh Assembly at the 2003 Welsh Assembly election, due to an illness he at the time refused to disclose.[2][7] It was later revealed to have been leukemia, and that he had been suffering from it since shortly after being selected as a candidate in 1999.[3] First Minister Rhodri Morgan described him as "[seeming] to have managed to cheat death on innumerable occasions."[3]
He was named Assembly Politician of the Year by Channel 4 in 2002.[8][9]
In 2002, Edwards called for the Welsh media to end its 'obsession' with rugby, a sport he described Wales as being 'frankly hopeless' at, saying that they should instead focus on football.[10][11] He was criticised by Gareth Evans, who stated that he was "just jumping on a bandwagon" and that Wales "have had five minutes of glory in football. [Wales has] enjoyed more success in rugby over the past 100 years."[12]
