Iain Duncan Smith

George Iain Duncan Smith ( born April 9, 1954 in Edinburgh, Scotland) is a British politician. He was from September 2001 to November 2003 Chairman of the British Conservative Party. In the cabinet Cameron he is since May 2010 Minister for Work and Pensions.

Early career

Duncan Smith calls himself Iain Duncan Smith, but is also commonly known by the abbreviation IDS. He is the son of the Royal Air Force Captain WGG Duncan Smith and his wife Pamela, a ballet dancer. Duncan Smith converted to Catholicism as a teenager and went through a training in the Navy training ship HMS Conway off the island of Anglesey and attended the elite military academy Sandhurst. In 1975 he became a member of the Scots Guards and served in Rhodesia and Northern Ireland. After his six years of military service, he went to General Electric in 1981 and joined the conservatives in the party. He also married in 1982 Elizabeth Fremantle, a daughter of the 5th Baron Cottesloe, with whom he has four children. In 1987 he stood for the Conservatives as a candidate for the general election in the constituency Bradford West. In 1992, he won the seat for Chingford and Woodford Green, where he succeeded Norman Tebbit, who went into political retirement.

Political rise

Duncan Smith, a staunch Euro-skeptic, was with his attitude of conservative, but pro-European government of John Major (1992-1997) an eyesore. By 1997, Duncan Smith remained a backbencher, but was then after the power change, Tony Blair brought to power in 1997, taken by William Hague in his shadow cabinet. When the Labour Party again in 2001 was able to record a victory in itself, Hague resigned as leader of the Conservative; as his successor Duncan Smith was determined on 12 September, which was able to prevail thus against Kenneth Clarke. First, he was an outsider, however, received the support of Margaret Thatcher, so he still was able to secure a certain power base within the Conservatives. Because of the immediately preceding attacks in New York on 11 September 2001, the announcement of the change of power with the Conservatives on 13 September was postponed.

The fact that Duncan Smith is an avowed Catholic, has resulted in the traditional Anglican- Protestant Britain for fear of a creeping catholicization in the political class, as well as Charles Kennedy, the former leader of the Liberal Democrats, a Catholic, while Tony Blair, himself a Protestant is married to a Catholic. Legally, it is prohibited in the UK by the Catholic Relief Act of 1829 a Catholic to give the British monarch on issues of post- occupation in the Anglican Church Council - the voice on the issue of Bishop insertions would be one of the tasks of the British Prime Minister, but applies the personal commitment of a Prime Minister in today's largely secular Britain as hardly problematic.

Criticism and no-confidence vote

Despite the support of Thatcher Duncan Smith was not very popular within the conservatives because he was deemed not to particularly talented rhetorically. The satirical magazine Private Eye, he was considered Iain Duncan Cough ( the hüstelnde Iain Duncan ), even if his loyalty and honesty were beyond question. Electoral success for the Conservatives failed to materialize, however. During the Congress of the Conservatives in 2002, he said, referring to yourself, you should never have a silent people underestimate, but was expected of a conservative party leaders a more aggressive opposition to the Blair government. In November, he appealed the sentence unite or die - keep together or die in the unity of the party, in whose ranks the support readiness for him, however, further eroded. Already in February 2003 appeared in the Independent reporting that several Tory MPs WOULD CHOOSE a vote of no confidence against Duncan Smith considered. In the public decreased his popularity ratings and he was the prime target of satirical programs. Finally it came on October 29, the expected no-confidence vote by the Conservative MP, 90 voted against him, 75 for him. He then resigned as chairman. Successor was finally Michael Howard.

After 2003,

After his resignation, he founded the Centre for Social Justice, a center-right think tank, to life, which deals mainly with problems around the British inner cities. As the House of Parliament he was re-elected in his constituency in 2005 with a clear majority. He has also written a thriller novel, The Devil 's Tune, which was, however, largely panned by critics.

Activities as Minister for Work and Pensions

Since May 2010 Smith is Minister for Work and Pensions in the Cabinet Cameron and continues in this role, among other things, a reduction of the British welfare state a. In April 2013 Smith received international media attention when he cuts in social assistance in the UK defended in an interview on the radio station BBC on the grounds that he could live permanently from £ 53 per week, then in the UK, an online petition has been started, the Smith to prompt you for a year to give up 97 % of its official content and to live in this time of £ 53 per week.

Swell

Minister of Labour ( UK )
Member of the House of Commons (United Kingdom)
Conservative Party Member
Briton
Born in 1954
Politicians ( 20th century)
Politicians ( 21st century)

Cameron ministry Jeremy Hunt (politician) Owen Paterson Maria Miller Michael Moore (British politician) Thomas Galbraith, 2nd Baron Strathclyde Sir George Young, 6th Baronet Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby Benjamin Disraeli Alec Douglas-Home

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