Henry McLeish
The Right Honourable Henry McLeish (born June
15, 1948) is a Scottish
politician. He served as the second First Minister of Scotland from
2000 to November 8, 2001, following the sudden death of Donald Dewar,
and had been the MP for Fife Central from 1987 to 2001 and MSP for Fife
Central from 1997 to 2003. Henry resigned as First Minister in 2001
amid a scandal involving allegations he sub-let part of his
constituency office without registering this, in the 'register of
interests', with Parliamentary authorities.The Officegate scandal was a controversy surrounding then Scottish First Minister Henry McLeish in 2001. It resulted in his resignation from the post. While McLeish was a Westminster MP between 1987 and 1998, before the advent of devolution, he sub-let his constituency office in Glenrothes, Fife, but failed to register it, or refund the income to the House of Commons. The issue was raised by the Scottish Conservative & Unionist Party in the Scottish Parliament in April 2001. At that time he repaid the money to Westminster, but remained under pressure to resign, mainly from the Scottish National Party who claimed the issue questioned his integrity fatally. McLeish fought against these calls for him to go, claming all along that the issue was "a muddle, not a fiddle", but eventually succumed to the pressure to resign on November 8. He was replaced by Jack McConnell.
Henry McLeish was a professional footballer playing for East Fife F.C., which he signed for after a spell at Leeds United F.C. and also represented Scotland as a youth international. While First Minister he was embarrassed when an open microphone recorded him making derogatory comments to Helen Liddell in a TV studio. He described John Reid as "a patronising bastard" and said of his colleague Brian Wilson "Brian is supposed to be in charge of Africa but he spends most of his time in bloody Dublin. He is a liability."
Since leaving mainstream politics Henry has become a consultant with political and public relations consultancy Halogen Communications Ltd and has written a number of books including Scotland First: Truth and Consequences and Global Scots.
Henry is also is a Hartman Hotz Visiting Professor in Law and Liberal Arts and Sciences at the Fulbright College, University of Arkansas, USA. Visiting Professor at the Graduate School of International Studies at the University of Denver, USA. Visiting lecturer at the United States Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA. Honorary Fellow at the College of Humanities and Social Science at Edinburgh University, Scotland. Honorary Fellow at the Cambridge Land Institute, Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge. Adviser, Consultant and Facilitator to the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions and the European Monitoring Centre for Change, Dublin, Ireland. Adviser and Consultant to the LEED Programme of the OECD in Paris, France, including visits to Austria, Italy, and Mexico.
He is also a consultant in partnership with Jeremy Harrison, Cambridge (Public Value Partnership working on new project development and evaluation of existing projects in the community and voluntary sector.
See also
Donald Dewar
Jack McConnell
John Smith
Tony Blair
Gordon Brown
John Reid
Alistair Darling