22 Facts About Cecil Parkinson

Cecil Parkinson successfully managed the Conservative Party's 1983 election campaign, and was rewarded with an appointment as Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, but was forced to resign following revelations that his former secretary, Sara Keays, was pregnant with his child, whom she later bore and named Flora Keays.

Cecil Parkinson resigned that office in 1990, on the same day that Thatcher resigned as Prime Minister.

Cecil Parkinson was created Baron Parkinson in 1992, and served in the House of Lords until his retirement in September 2015.

Cecil Parkinson was born at 4 Edward Street, Carnforth, Lancashire, the son of Sydney Parkinson, a warehouseman for a corn dealer, later a railwayman, and his wife, Bridget, nee Graham, who was from a Northern Irish family from Tyrone and Fermanagh but their roots were in Scotland.

Cecil Parkinson was educated at Lancaster Royal Grammar School, a state-run day and boarding school for boys, from 1943 to 1950 after passing his eleven-plus from where he won a scholarship to Cambridge University, where he read English at Emmanuel College, later switching to read law.

Cecil Parkinson won a Blue as an athlete, competing over 220 and 440 yards.

Cecil Parkinson even canvassed for them at the 1950 and 1951 General Elections.

Cecil Parkinson did National service as an NCO in the Royal Air Force from 1950 to 1952.

Cecil Parkinson trained and qualified as a chartered accountant, and founded Parkinson-Hart Securities in 1961.

Cecil Parkinson was elected MP for Enfield West at a by-election in November 1970, following the death of Iain Macleod.

Cecil Parkinson worked on the Conservative Party's 1983 election campaign, standing in the new Hertsmere constituency after South Hertfordshire's abolition.

Cecil Parkinson was forced to resign on 14 October 1983, after the news of Sara Keays' pregnancy had become public knowledge.

Subsequently, as a result of a dispute over child maintenance payments, Cecil Parkinson was able to gain an injunction in 1993, forbidding the British media from making any reference to their daughter.

Cecil Parkinson resigned along with Margaret Thatcher when she was replaced by John Major, and stood down from the House of Commons at the 1992 general election.

That year, Cecil Parkinson published his memoirs, in which he claimed that, with a determined campaign, Thatcher would have won the second ballot of the Conservative leadership election, when her Cabinet had warned her she would lose and thus persuaded her to stand down.

Cecil Parkinson returned to front-line politics when he was made Conservative Party Chairman again, by William Hague, in June 1997.

Cecil Parkinson retired from this role in 1998; afterward he kept a low profile, although he was a vice-chairman of the Conservative Way Forward group.

Cecil Parkinson was the Honorary President of Conservative Friends of Poland.

Cecil Parkinson was a supporter of Preston North End, and in November 1988 paid a tribute to Tom Finney on This Is Your Life.

Cecil Parkinson died from colorectal cancer at The London Clinic in Marylebone, London, on 22 January 2016.

Cecil Parkinson left nothing in his will for his daughter Flora: in April 2017, it was reported that Sara Keays was preparing to sue Parkinson's estate to continue to gain support for her daughter's 24-hour care, for regular payments had ceased a few months after Parkinson died.

Cecil Parkinson was one of the three Presidents of the UK-based charity Action on Addiction.