1. Reg Prentice was the most senior Labour figure ever to defect to the Conservative Party.
11 Facts About Reg Prentice
1. 2.
Reg Prentice was born in Croydon, Surrey, and educated at Whitgift School in South Croydon, then at the London School of Economics.
3.
Reg Prentice served in Austria and Italy during World War II.
4.
Reg Prentice was a councillor for Whitehorse Manor in the then-County Borough of Croydon from 1949, having stood unsuccessfully in Thornton Heath ward in 1947.
5.
Reg Prentice first stood, unsuccessfully, for parliament in Croydon North in 1950 and 1951, then Streatham in 1955.
6.
At the next shadow cabinet election, Reg Prentice topped the poll and he was again re-elected in 1973, this time finishing in third place.
7.
Reg Prentice appealed unsuccessfully from the rostrum of the Labour Party Conference for the National Executive Committee to overturn their endorsement of his deselection.
8.
In 1977, Reg Prentice left the Labour Party after a series of battles with left-wing constituency activists and joined the Conservative Party.
9.
Reg Prentice was elected as a Conservative Member of Parliament for Daventry in the 1979 general election.
10.
Reg Prentice was a Minister of State at the Department of Health and Social Security in Margaret Thatcher's government between 1979 and 1981.
11.
Reg Prentice was knighted in 1987, the year he stepped down as an MP.