Hugh Mackay, 14th Lord Reay

Hugh William Mackay, 14th Lord Reay, Baron Mackay (19 July 1937 – 10 May 2013) was a British politician and Conservative member of the House of Lords. He was the only male Lord of Parliament to sit in the House of Lords following the abolition of the automatic right of all British hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords in 1999, the only female being The Lady Saltoun.


The Lord Reay
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Trade and Industry
In office
22 May 1991  14 April 1992
MonarchElizabeth II
Prime MinisterJohn Major
Preceded byPost vacant
Succeeded byThe Baroness Denton of Wakefield
Lord-in-waiting
Government Whip
In office
24 July 1989  21 May 1991
MonarchElizabeth II
Prime MinisterMargaret Thatcher
Preceded byThe Earl of Arran
Succeeded byThe Earl Howe
Member of the European Parliament
In office
1 January 1973  16 July 1979
ConstituencyAppointed by Parliament
Member of the House of Lords
Lord Temporal
In office
10 March 1963  10 May 2013
Hereditary Peerage
Preceded byThe 13th Lord Reay
Succeeded byThe 5th Lord Borwick
Personal details
Born
Hugh William Mackay

(1937-07-19)19 July 1937
Died10 May 2013(2013-05-10) (aged 75)
Political partyCrossbencher (1963-66);
Liberal (1966-71);
Crossbencher (1971-72);
Conservative (1972-2013)
RelationsSee Clan Mackay
Alma materEton College
Christ Church, Oxford

Biography

Lord Reay was the only son of Aeneas Alexander Mackay, 13th Lord Reay. He was educated at Eton College and Christ Church, Oxford.

He succeeded to the title upon his father's death in 1963, sitting in the House of Lords first as a cross-bencher, then as a Liberal, and finally, from 1972, as a Conservative. He championed causes from the abolition of capital punishment to restrictions on onshore wind farms.[1]

He sat as an appointed Member of the European Parliament from 1973 until the first elections in 1979. He also served as a delegate to the Council of Europe, living at the family's Dutch estates in Ophemert.

He subsequently was appointed as a House of Lords whip in 1989 by Margaret Thatcher. In 1991, he was moved by her successor, John Major, to the Department of Trade and Industry as a Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, but he left the government at the 1992 general election.[2]

With the passage of the House of Lords Act 1999, Lord Reay along with almost all other hereditary peers lost his automatic right to sit in the House of Lords, however, he was one of the 92 elected hereditary peers to remain in the House of Lords pending completion of House of Lords reform.

Lord Reay was the hereditary Clan Chief of Clan Mackay, and Lord of Ophemert and Zennewijnen in the Netherlands.[3]

Family

Lord Reay was married twice. With his first wife Tessa Keswick, (née the Honourable Annabel Terese Fraser), a daughter of Lord Lovat (she is now wife of Henry Keswick), he had two sons and one daughter. With his second wife Victoria Isabella, youngest daughter of the late 1st Baron Bruntisfield, he had two daughters.

He was succeeded by his elder son, Æneas Simon Mackay, Master of Reay (born 20 March 1965), a banker, who married, on 14 January 2010, Mia Ruulio, elder daughter of Markus Ruulio of Helsinki. His heir is his son the Honourable Alexander Shimi Markus Mackay (born 21 April 2010).[4]

  • Profile, mapsstatsandpolitics.talktalk.net; accessed 26 March 2016.
  • Profile, thepeerage.com; accessed 26 March 2016.

References

  1. "Clan Chiefs". Clan Mackay Society.
  2. "Lord Reay - Obituary". Telegraph.
  3. "Clan Chiefs". Clan Mackay Society.
  4. "Birth Announcement in The Telegraph". The Daily Telegraph. London, UK. Retrieved 22 August 2011.
Peerage of Scotland
Preceded by
Aeneas Mackay
Lord Reay
1963–2013
Succeeded by
Aeneas Mackay
Dutch nobility
Preceded by
Aeneas Mackay
Baron Mackay
1963–2013
Succeeded by
Aeneas Mackay
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