David Stoddart, Baron Stoddart of Swindon

David Leonard Stoddart, Baron Stoddart of Swindon (4 May 1926 – 14 November 2020) was a British politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Swindon from 1970 to 1983, and as a life peer in the House of Lords from 1983 to his death in 2020.

Early life and career David Leonard Stoddart was born on 4 May 1926 to Arthur and Queenie Stoddart. He was educated at St Clement Danes Holborn Estate Grammar School for Boys and Henley Grammar School. Upon leaving school he worked as a trainee for the GPO telephones division, as a manager at a grocery shop, as a clerk on the railways and in hospitals, and finally as a clerical worker for the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) at the power station it operated in Earley, near Reading.

Political career Stoddart joined the Labour Party in 1947. and the leader of the council from 1967 to 1972. He was Chief Front Bench spokesman on energy (1983–1988) and served as House of Lords Whip during the same period.

He was expelled from the Labour benches in the House of Lords in 2002 for backing a Socialist Alliance candidate at the 2001 general election, an action he took because he strongly opposed the "parachuting" of Shaun Woodward, a defector from the Conservative Party, into the safe Labour seat of St Helens South. a position he held from 1985 until May 2007.

Personal life Stoddart married Jennifer Percival-Alwyn in 1961, with whom he had two sons. He also had a daughter from a previous marriage.