John Julian Ganzoni, 2nd Baron Belstead, Baron Ganzoni, PC (30 September 1932 – 3 December 2005) was a British Conservative politician and peer who served as Leader of the House of Lords under Margaret Thatcher from 1988 to 1990.

Quick Facts The Right HonourableThe Lord BelsteadPC, Paymaster General ...
The Lord Belstead
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Paymaster General
In office
28 November 1990  11 April 1992
Prime MinisterJohn Major
Preceded byRichard Ryder
Succeeded byJohn Cope
Minister of State for Northern Ireland
In office
28 November 1990  14 April 1992
Prime MinisterJohn Major
Preceded byJohn Cope
Succeeded byRobert Atkins
Leader of the House of Lords
Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal
In office
10 January 1988  28 November 1990
Prime MinisterMargaret Thatcher
Preceded byThe Viscount Whitelaw
(Leader of Lords)
John Wakeham
(Lord Privy Seal)
Succeeded byThe Lord Waddington
Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
In office
June 1983  January 1988
Prime MinisterMargaret Thatcher
Preceded byThe Earl Ferrers
Succeeded byThe Earl Ferrers
Minister of State for Environment
In office
13 June 1987  10 January 1988
Prime MinisterMargaret Thatcher
Preceded byWilliam Waldegrave
Succeeded byThe Earl of Caithness
Minister of State for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
In office
13 June 1983  13 June 1987
Prime MinisterMargaret Thatcher
Preceded byAlick Buchanan-Smith
Succeeded byJohn Gummer
Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
In office
5 April 1982  13 June 1983
Prime MinisterMargaret Thatcher
Preceded byRichard Luce
Succeeded byRichard Luce
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Home Affairs
In office
7 May 1979  5 April 1982
Prime MinisterMargaret Thatcher
Preceded byShirley Summerskill
Succeeded byThe Lord Elton
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
In office
5 June 1973  4 March 1974
Prime MinisterEdward Heath
Preceded byThe Lord Windlesham (Minister of State)
Succeeded byThe Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Science
In office
24 June 1970  5 June 1973
Prime MinisterEdward Heath
Preceded byJoan Lestor
Succeeded byTimothy Raison
Member of the House of Lords
as a hereditary peer
18 December 1958  11 November 1999
Preceded byThe 1st Baron Belstead
Succeeded bySeat abolished
as a life peer
17 November 1999  3 December 2005
Personal details
Born(1932-09-30)30 September 1932
Died3 December 2005(2005-12-03) (aged 73)
Political partyConservative
Alma materChrist Church, Oxford
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Background and education

Ganzoni was the only son of Sir John Ganzoni, a barrister and Conservative MP for Ipswich who was created Baron Belstead in 1938, and his wife Gwendolen Gertrude Turner, daughter of Arthur Turner, of Ipswich. He went to Eton before reading History at Christ Church, Oxford.[citation needed]

Political career

Belstead showed little interest in politics at first, and waited six years after succeeding to the peerage on his father's death in 1958 before making his maiden speech. In 1970, Edward Heath appointed him to become Parliamentary Under-Secretary to Margaret Thatcher at the Department of Education and Science; he was moved in the same rank to the Northern Ireland Office three years later.

When Margaret Thatcher led the Tories back to power in 1979, she sent him to the Home Office. He was then made Minister at the Foreign Office when Lord Carrington and his team resigned after the Falklands invasion. In 1980, he was interviewed by the BBC's Panorama current affairs program about Britain's preparations for a nuclear attack.

He next moved to the Ministry of Fisheries and Food, and went back to the Education Department again before becoming Deputy Leader to William Whitelaw as Leader of the House of Lords. He succeeded Whitelaw in that post in 1988, taking the sinecure post of Lord Privy Seal at the same time.[1]

After losing his Cabinet seat, which he had gained when he became Lord Privy Seal, in 1990 he became Paymaster General and Northern Ireland Minister under John Major, retiring from the Government to become Chairman of the Parole Board in 1992.

In the 1983 New Year Honours, he was sworn of the Privy Council.[2] After the House of Lords Act 1999 removed the automatic right of hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords, he was created a life peer[3] (an honour given to all former Leaders of the House of Lords) as Baron Ganzoni, of Ipswich in the County of Suffolk on 17 November 1999.[4] He also gave his name to the new "Belstead Centre" at Woodbridge School.

Personal life

Lord Belstead never married. He died in December 2005, aged 73, when both the hereditary peerage and the baronetcy became extinct.[citation needed] He is buried in the churchyard of St Mary's, Great Bealings, Suffolk.

He was an active Freemason and president of the Board of General Purposes for the United Grand Lodge of England.[5] He was appointed to be a Deputy Lieutenant of the County of Suffolk on 2 April 1979.[6]

Coat of arms

Coat of arms of John Ganzoni, 2nd Baron Belstead
Notes
Coat of arms of the Ganzoni family
Coronet
A coronet of a Baron
Crest
A Demi Lion Or supporting a Gentian Plant as in the Arms
Escutcheon
Per fess Azure and Argent a Gentian Plant flowered and eradicated proper between in chief a Mullet and an Increscent both Or
Supporters
On either side a Seahorse proper gorged with a Collar pendent therefrom a Portcullis chained Or
Motto
Fidelitas Vincit (Fidelity overcomes)

References

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