Reg Underhill

Henry Reginall Underhill, Baron Underhill CBE (8 May 1914 – 12 March 1993),^[1] was a British party worker and Labour politician.

Background

He was the youngest son of Henry James Underhill and his wife Alice Maud Butler.^[2] Underhill was educated at Leyton Central School and left it in 1929.^[3] Aged only sixteen, he joined the Labour Party in the following year and was a Lloyd's Underwriter until 1933.^[3]

Career

Subsequently, Underhill began working as a junior clerk in the party's head office and became vice-chairman in the constituency of Leyton West.^[3] He was appointed an honorary secretary of the British Workers' Sports Association and in 1936 travelled with the British delegation to the People's Olympiad in Barcelona.^[4] During the Second World War, Underhill refused to fight, citing his socialism, however served in the National Fire Service in London, often acting as a driver.^[3]

In 1945, after the end of the war, he was assistant to Morgan Phillips, at that time the General Secretary of the Labour Party.^[3] He was then administrative assistant to the party's national agent until 1947 and worked as propaganda officer until the next year.^[3] From 1948, Underhill served as Labour's regional organiser in the West Midlands until 1960, when he was chosen assistant national agent.^[3]

In 1972, he finally became the National Agent of the Labour Party.^[5] His work involved reporting on the Militant tendency as entrists into the Labour Party, eventually leading to their expulsion from the party.^[6] Underhill was awarded a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 1976 Prime Minister's Resignation Honours^[7] and on his retirement from his post in 1979, he was created a life peer with the title Baron Underhill, of Leyton, in Greater London on 12 July.^[8] He became Labour's Opposition front bench spokesman on transport in the House of Lords in 1980 and on electoral affairs in 1983.^[3] On the resignation of Cledwyn Hughes in 1982, Underhill was elected deputy leader of Labour in the House, a post he held until 1989.^[9] He was a founding member of the reformed Association of Professional, Executive, Clerical and Computer Staff and received the union's gold medal.^[3]

Family

He married Flora Philbrick in 1937.^[9] Underhill died in a hospital in Epping in 1993 and left a daughter, Joan, and two sons, Terry and Bob.^[9]