Representative George Thomas Davis

Thomas George Thomas, 1st Viscount Tonypandy (29 January 1909 – 22 September 1997), was a British Labour politician who served in the House of Commons for nearly four decades and was Speaker of the House of Commons from 1976 to 1983. A prominent Welsh figure in national politics, he held ministerial office in Harold Wilson’s governments, notably as Secretary of State for Wales from 1968 to 1970, and later became a hereditary peer as Viscount Tonypandy, of Rhondda in the County of Mid Glamorgan.

Thomas was born in Port Talbot, Glamorgan, South Wales, the second son of Zachariah Thomas, a Welsh-speaking miner from Carmarthen, and Emma Jane Tilbury, whose father had been a founder of the English Methodist Church in Tonypandy. He had two elder sisters, Ada May and Dolly, an elder brother, Emrys, and a younger brother, Ivor. His father, who became a heavy drinker, enlisted at the start of the First World War; the family later discovered that he had allocated his soldier’s allowance to another woman in Kent, forcing Emma to take her marriage certificate to court to prove she was his lawful wife. Zachariah never returned to South Wales and died of tuberculosis in 1925. Thomas was raised largely by his mother in the village of Trealaw, just across the Rhondda Fawr river from Tonypandy, in modest circumstances typical of the South Wales coalfield.

Educated at Trealaw Boys’ School, Thomas passed the scholarship examination to Tonypandy Higher Grade School, later Tonypandy Secondary Grammar School, at a time when all four of his siblings had left school at 13 for work—his sisters entering domestic service, his elder brother going into the mines, and his younger brother working in a shop. On leaving school he became a pupil teacher, first in Trealaw and then at Fanshawe Crescent School in Dagenham, Essex. He subsequently undertook a two‑year teacher‑training course at University College, Southampton. After qualifying, he worked as a teacher in both London and Cardiff, an experience that shaped his later interest in social policy and the conditions of working-class communities in Wales and beyond.

Thomas entered Parliament at the 1945 general election, part of the Labour landslide under Clement Attlee. He represented Cardiff Central from 1945 to 1950, and, following boundary changes, Cardiff West from 1950 until his retirement from the House of Commons at the 1983 general election. When Labour returned to power under Harold Wilson in 1964, Thomas was appointed joint Under‑Secretary of State for the Home Department. In April 1966 he became Minister of State for Wales in the newly created Welsh Office and was one of the first ministers on the scene of the Aberfan disaster on 21 October 1966, when a National Coal Board colliery spoil tip slid down a hillside and engulfed houses and a primary school, killing 144 people, 116 of them children. Initially noted for his sympathy toward the villagers, he later became embroiled in controversy when he refused to order the immediate removal of the remaining tips surrounding the village. When the government eventually agreed to their removal, £150,000 was taken from the Aberfan Charity Fund—raised to support victims and their families—as part payment of the costs. Just over 30 years later, the sum was repaid by the then Secretary of State for Wales, Ron Davies, who described the original decision as “a wrong that needed to be righted.”

In early 1967 Thomas was moved to the post of Minister of State for Commonwealth Affairs. In 1968 he entered the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Wales, a position he held until 1970. During his tenure he presided over the investiture of the Prince of Wales at Caernarfon Castle in 1969, reflecting his fervent attachment to the Royal Family. He was strongly opposed to Welsh nationalism and particularly hostile to Plaid Cymru and the Welsh Language Society, positions that would later inform his opposition to devolution. After Labour’s period in office ended in 1970, Thomas remained a prominent backbencher, and in 1974 he was elected Chairman of Ways and Means and Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons, marking the beginning of his association with the speakership.

In 1976 Thomas was elected Speaker of the House of Commons, succeeding Selwyn Lloyd. His tenure coincided with the first broadcasting of parliamentary proceedings, initially in audio only, which brought him unprecedented public attention and made his Welsh-accented calls of “Order! Order!” familiar throughout Britain. Despite his long association with the Labour Party, he proved more impartial in the Chair than some party colleagues had expected. He is the most recent Speaker to have previously served as a government minister. Thomas retired from the Commons in June 1983, and on 11 July 1983, by Letters Patent, he was elevated to the peerage as Viscount Tonypandy, of Rhondda in the County of Mid Glamorgan. His was the last creation of a viscountcy for a non‑royal person in the United Kingdom; William Whitelaw, often cited as the last such creation, had received his viscountcy a month earlier, in June 1983. In 1983 Thomas was also awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws (LLD) degree by the University of Leeds and was the subject of the television programme “This Is Your Life,” surprised by Eamonn Andrews at the Royal Albert Hall before a charity concert for National Children’s Homes.

In the House of Lords, Lord Tonypandy became an outspoken critic of the European Union and of the Maastricht Treaty. In a June 1993 debate he endorsed Baroness Thatcher’s criticisms of further European sociopolitical integration and defended her against charges of extremism made by Roy Jenkins. His longstanding opposition to Welsh nationalism culminated in his hostility to the devolution proposals advanced by Tony Blair’s government in 1997. Despite suffering from cancer, he agreed to serve as president of the “Just Say No” campaign, which opposed the creation of a Welsh Assembly. The campaign’s steering committee included figures such as Nick Bourne, David Davies (later MP for Monmouth), and Alun Cairns. That same year he gave a high‑profile endorsement to Sir James Goldsmith’s Referendum Party, arguing that the European Union compromised the sovereignty of Parliament, and he wrote the foreword to Adrian Hilton’s book on the subject, “The Principality and Power of Europe.” Outside Parliament, he served as Chairman of the Bank of Wales from 1985 to 1991. A portrait of Thomas in the robes of the Speaker forms part of the Parliamentary Art Collection.

Throughout his life Thomas remained a deeply religious man and a prominent member of the Methodist Church. He served as a local preacher and as Vice‑President of the Methodist Conference, and his faith informed both his public rhetoric and his private conduct. Known by the nickname “Tommy Twice,” derived from his full name, he was a distinctive parliamentary personality whose voice and manner became emblematic of the Commons in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In April 1985 he was guest of honour at the “Easter Bacchanal” of the Treorchy Comprehensive School Alumni Association, though he was not himself an alumnus. During his speech he was heckled by several pro‑European alumni; when he attempted to calm the atmosphere, hecklers threw cutlery that struck and smashed several drinks optics, resulting in a substantial extra bill for the association. Thomas denounced the group as the “Bullingdon Boyos.” Allegations at the time that he had instigated the group were later shown to be inaccurate.

After his death, former Welsh Labour MP Leo Abse revealed that Thomas had been homosexual and had been blackmailed because of it. Abse, who had introduced the private member’s bill that led to the partial decriminalisation of homosexuality in Britain, recounted in his book “Tony Blair: The Man Behind the Smile” that Thomas had paid money to blackmailers to keep aspects of his private life secret. Abse stated that he had once lent Thomas £800 to pay off blackmailers and had advised him when he contracted a venereal disease from a rent boy. He described Thomas as otherwise a tough and fearless politician who would “dangerously over‑react and panic if there was the slightest sign of a crack in the thin ice upon which he skated all this life,” adding that “the slightest tremor of scandal … reduced him to a jelly.” Abse wrote that he chose to reveal Thomas’s sexuality because he believed that “the gifts he gave to the nation fundamentally arose because of, not despite, his sexual orientation,” arguing that Thomas brought “a feminine sensibility and empathy” to politics. In July 2014, British media reported that South Wales Police were investigating allegations that Thomas had sexually abused a nine‑year‑old boy in the late 1960s; in March 2015 the police confirmed they were examining claims that he had been involved in child abuse. The investigation concluded in March 2017 with no action being taken.

Lord Tonypandy died in Cardiff on 22 September 1997. He had been twice engaged to be married but never wed, and with no heir the viscountcy became extinct upon his death. He was buried in Trealaw Cemetery, close to the community in the Rhondda where he had grown up. Among his published works are his memoir, “George Thomas, Mr Speaker: The Memoirs of Viscount Tonypandy” (Century, London, 1985), and “My Wales,” with photographs by Lord Snowdon (Guild Publishing, London, 1986). His parliamentary contributions are recorded in Hansard, and his career was documented in contemporary media, including a 1969 BBC fly‑on‑the‑wall documentary about the Welsh Office.