Henry McLeish

The Right Honourable Henry McLeish
First Minister of Scotland
In office 26 October 2000 – 8 November 2001
Monarch	Elizabeth II
Deputy	Jim Wallace
Preceded by	Jim Wallace (Acting)
Succeeded by	Jim Wallace (Acting)
Leader of Labour in the Scottish Parliament
In office 27 October 2000 – 8 November 2001
Preceded by	Donald Dewar
Succeeded by	Jack McConnell
Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning
In office 17 May 1999 – 26 October 2000
First Minister	Donald Dewar Jim Wallace (Acting)
Preceded by	Position established
Succeeded by	Wendy Alexander
Member of the Scottish Parliament for Central Fife
In office 6 May 1999 – 1 May 2003
Preceded by	Constituency Created
Succeeded by	Christine May
Member of Parliament for Central Fife
In office 11 June 1987 – 7 June 2001
Preceded by	Willie Hamilton
Succeeded by	John MacDougall
Personal details
Born	15 June 1948 (1948-06-15) Methil, Scotland
Political party	Labour

Henry McLeish

Personal information
Playing position	Wing half
Youth career
–	Leeds United
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps†	(Gls)†
1964–1969	East Fife	84	(2)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. † Appearances (Goals).

Henry Baird McLeish (born 15 June 1948) is a Scottish Labour Party politician, author and academic. Formerly a professional association football player, McLeish was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Central Fife from 1987 to 2001 and the Member of the Scottish Parliament for Central Fife from 1999 to 2003, during which time he also served as the second First Minister of Scotland, from 2000 to 2001, following the sudden death of Donald Dewar. He resigned in 2001 following a financial scandal.

Footballer and early political career

McLeish was a youth player at Leeds United and represented Scotland as a youth international. He then played in the Scottish Football League for East Fife.

After retiring as a football player he became a lecturer at Heriot-Watt University before entering politics.

McLeish was leader of Fife Regional Council, before his election as a Labour MP for Central Fife at the 1987 General Election. In the late 1980s and into the 1990s, McLeish was a Labour shadow spokesman for several portfolios, including the Scottish Office, transport, employment, and health and social security. When Labour came to power in 1997, McLeish was appointed as a Minister of the Scottish Office.

As Donald Dewar's right hand man in Westminster, McLeish helped secure devolution for Scotland and manoeuvre the Scotland Act through the Westminster Parliament. After the creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999, McLeish was elected as MSP for Fife Central and became Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning.

First Minister

After Dewar's death in 2000, McLeish defeated his rival Jack McConnell by 44 votes to 36 in the race to become the second First Minister. The ballot was held amongst a restricted electorate of Labour MSPs and members of Scottish Labour's national executive, because there was insufficient time for a full election to be held. Professor John Curtice, a prominent political analyst, commented that McLeish would not have the "kind of authority" that Donald Dewar enjoyed.

While First Minister, McLeish was widely commended as being a business-like manager of the Scottish Executive, with good political instincts and good relations in Westminster and Holyrood. He travelled widely, particularly in the United States, where he capitalised on sentimentalism for Scotland among American politicians to advance the cause of Scottish industry and export.^{[citation needed]} He managed several taskforces designed to improve the competitiveness of Scottish industry, especially the PILOT project for Scottish oil and gas supply chains. Even so, he was embarrassed when an open microphone recorded him with Helen Liddell in a TV studio, describing Scottish Secretary 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".

He resigned as First Minister in 2001 amid a scandal involving allegations he sub-let part of his tax-subsidised Westminster constituency office without it having been registered in the 'register of interests' kept in the Parliamentary office. The press called the affair Officegate. Though McLeish could not have personally benefited financially from the oversight, he undertook to repay the £36,000 rental income, and resigned to allow the Scottish Labour Party a clean break to prepare for the 2003 Parliamentary elections. McLeish did not seek re-election.

After politics

Since leaving mainstream politics McLeish has lectured widely in the United States, particularly at the United States Air Force Academy and the University of Arkansas, where he holds a visiting professorship shared between the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences and the University of Arkansas School of Law.

He is considered an expert on European-American relations and on the European Union.

He is a consultant with political and public relations consultancy Halogen Communications Ltd, as well as J. Chandler & Co., distributor of Buckfast Tonic Wine and has written a number of books including Scotland First: Truth and Consequences (2004), Global Scots: Voices from Afar (with Kenny MacAskill) (2006) (published in the UK as Global Scots: Making It in the Modern World), Wherever the Saltire Flies (with Kenny MacAskill) (2006) and Scotland: The Road Divides (with Tom Brown) (2007).

McLeish also holds the following positions and titles:

• Privy Counsellor
• Hartman Hotz Visiting Professor in Law and the Liberal Arts, jointly in the Fulbright College and Law School, University of Arkansas
• Visiting Professor at the Graduate School of International Studies at the University of Denver
• Visiting lecturer at the United States Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colorado
• Honorary Fellow at the College of Humanities and Social Science at Edinburgh University
• Honorary Fellow at the Cambridge Land Institute, Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge University
• Adviser, Consultant and Facilitator to the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions and the European Monitoring Centre for Change, Dublin, Republic of Ireland
• Adviser and Consultant to the LEED Programme of the OECD in Paris, France, including visits to Austria, Italy, and Mexico
• 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

In August 2007 he was appointed to the Scottish Broadcasting Commission (established by the Scottish Government). He also chaired the Scottish Prisons Commission, which produced a report into sentencing and the criminal justice system in 2008 entitled "Scotland's Choice".

McLeish concluded a "major report" on the state of football in Scotland, which had been commissioned by the Scottish Football Association, in April 2010. McLeish claimed that Scottish football was "underachieving, under-performing and under-funded" at a press conference to unveil the report.

Footnotes

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Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Willie Hamilton	Member of Parliament for Central Fife 1987–2001	Succeeded by John MacDougall
Scottish Parliament
New title	Member of the Scottish Parliament for Central Fife 1999–2003	Succeeded by Christine May
Political offices
New office	Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning 1999–2000	Succeeded by Wendy Alexander
Preceded by Jim Wallace Acting	First Minister of Scotland 2000–2001	Succeeded by Jim Wallace Acting
Party political offices
Preceded by Donald Dewar	Leader of the Scottish Labour Party 2000–2001	Succeeded by Jack McConnell