David Davies (Welsh politician)

David Thomas Charles Davies (born 27 July 1970) is a British Conservative Party politician. He has served Member of Parliament (MP) for Monmouth in South Wales since 2005. He served as Chair of the Welsh Affairs Select Committee for nine and a half years before becoming a Welsh Office Minister in December 2019. A vocal critic of the European Union, he supported Brexit in the 2016 EU referendum, and he has since been supportive of pro-Brexit pressure group Leave Means Leave.

Background
Davies was born in London and educated at Bassaleg School, Bassaleg, a suburb of Newport. He is the eldest  child of Peter and Kathleen Davies. After leaving school in 1988 he worked for the British Steel Corporation and served with the Territorial Army. He worked for his family in their shipping company, Burrow Heath Ltd, before he entered politics. He was also a Special Constable with the British Transport Police for 9 years.

He married Aliz Harnisfoger, who is Hungarian, in October 2003 in Monmouth, and they have three children. A keen sportsman, Davies has fought in several charity boxing matches as "The Tory Tornado" and is a former President of the Welsh Amateur Boxing Association.

Political career 
He unsuccessfully contested the safe Labour seat of Bridgend at the 1997 general election, finishing in second place 15,248 votes behind the sitting Labour MP Win Griffiths. As an opponent of the Welsh assembly who helped to set up the 'No' campaign in the devolution referendum, Davies gained a higher profile and was selected as Conservative candidate for Monmouth.  At the inaugural 1999 Welsh Assembly Election he was elected  to the National Assembly for Wales.

Davies speaks fluent Welsh after learning the language from scratch when he was elected to the National Assembly for Wales. He was awarded the accolade of Welsh Speaker of the Year and was the first AM to address the Welsh Language Society, Cymdeithas Yr Iaith Gymraeg, in Welsh.

He was elected at the 2005 general election as member of the House of Commons for Monmouth, the seat he held in the Welsh Assembly. He defeated the sitting Labour MP Huw Edwards by 4,527 votes, and remains the MP for the constituency. On 18 May 2005 he made his maiden speech giving a history of his constituency from Geoffrey of Monmouth onwards. In Parliament he joined the Welsh Affairs Select Committee on his election. After the 2015 general election, he was returned unopposed the chairmanship of the Committee.

In 2008, Davies criticised the National Black Police Association's race-based membership policy for not allowing white people interested in fighting racism to become full members. The text of the speech on his website states that Keith Vaz asked him to attend the meeting after Vaz was unable to fulfil the engagement himself.

Expenses
Davies was criticised by The Daily Telegraph, for claiming £2,000 and paying it to a family business. Davies defended his actions in an interview. Davies later said he had done nothing wrong, and told BBC Wales that the work was done at short notice and at cost value, and neither he nor any of his family made any profit from it. He said he was now having to use a specialist company in London for the production of such material, one that was used by many other MPs, and the real cost was significantly higher.

In May 2009, after revelations about expenses were published by The Daily Telegraph in relation to other politicians, Davies became the first member of the Commons voluntarily to put all his expense claims in public for anybody to examine. They were scrutinised by an independent panel that included a journalist, and a former Labour candidate among others, and Davies emerged unscathed from his decision to release all his expenses claims from the House of Commons. Davies continues to employ his wife as a part time Office Manager.

Welsh Affairs Committee
In June 2010, Davies was appointed Chairman of the Welsh Affairs Committee. He is a former member of the Home Affairs Select Committee and is an advocate of tough measures to deal with criminality. Davies is also Vice-Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary China Group and a member of the All-Party Parliamentary British-German Group. In January 2012, the Prime Minister David Cameron announced his appointment as a representative of the UK delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

Nigel Evans trial
During the trial of fellow Welsh MP Nigel Evans, who was also Davies' best man at his 2003 wedding, Davies gave evidence of his character, stating that Evans liked a drink and became jovial when intoxicated, unlike some people who have a dark side. Davies is quoted as saying "He’s been a good friend of mine for a lot of years. I am stunned by these allegations and find them impossible to believe." Evans was acquitted.

Political views

Same sex marriage
Davies opposed his Government's plans to introduce same-sex marriage, describing them as "barking mad" due to the possibility that they may alienate the Conservative party's traditional supporters; expanding on these views in a television interview he also expressed the opinion that "most parents would prefer their children not to be gay". Davies said he was not bigoted, offering the unusual defence that he had once fought an amateur boxing match against the "Pink Pounder", an openly gay boxer.

On 5 February 2013, Davies voted against in the House of Commons Second Reading vote on marriage equality in Britain.

However, on 9 July 2019, Davies voted in favour of allowing same sex marriage in Northern Ireland.

Brexit
Davies has said "I support the sentiments of Better Off Out" which campaigns for the United Kingdom to leave the European Union. In May 2019, while attempting a television interview on College Green, Davies was confronted by a pro-Brexit activist, clearly unaware of his identity, who accused him of being a 'remoaner', a 'liar', a 'snowflake' and not a Brexiteer. Davies admitted that, although he had voted to leave in the referendum, he had voted for Theresa May's failed Brexit withdrawal agreement. He accused the activist of having "a big mouth and access to a keyboard" and attempted to record the incident on the body camera that was strapped around his torso.

In October 2019, commenting on his interventions following the Speaker's refusal to permit a debate on the Government's Brexit agreement, The Guardian's political sketchwriter John Crace described Davies as "one of the dimmest people in parliament – even the sheep in his Welsh constituency have a higher IQ".

Climate change
Davies is sceptical of the theory of man-made global warming and in 2013 questioned the evidence in Parliament.

Race relations
In January 2010 he was criticised for referring to some communities as having imported "barbaric views on women". Commenting on a rape case, Davies said that upbringing could be a major factor although he saw it as "not an Islamic issue... let me be quite clear, and it's not a racial issue".

During a phone-in during the Jeremy Vine show on BBC Radio 2, Davies told a member of the public that she should join the BNP after she suggested it should be a requirement for Welsh civil and public servants to understand Welsh. On his web page, he states his opinion 'that people who come to this country should learn English and be expected to work and to fit in with our rules, culture and traditions'.

Charity sector
Davies is a critic of a few national charities – Save the Children, RSPCA and NSPCC – that he regards as behaving in a politically motivated way, and is quoted as saying that "this is part of a pattern of charities which focus more on lobbying the government on issues than on their causes." He is not the only MP to believe this as a recent study by nfpSynergy showed that the majority of MPs are wary of charities "being political".

Asylum
Davies was described by a rival candidate as being on the "far right of the Conservative Party", which he described as an attempt to smear him as "some sort of Nazi" for raising concerns over immigration. A critic of the Coalition, Davies once wrote a letter to his constituents apologising for "incompetence at the highest levels of government" and accusing David Cameron of failing to listen to the concerns of backbenchers and the people who elected them.

Davies was criticised in 2015 for using the Charlie Hebdo terrorist attack to promote the Conservative Party election pledge to abolish the Human Rights Act 1998. Davies' claim that “under current laws, including the Human Rights Act, anyone can come to the UK and make a claim for asylum”  was rebutted in The Guardian and two separate articles by Dr Mark Elliot at the University of Cambridge, and by legal practitioner Adam Wagner. Wagner commented that Davies "does not understand the law." Wagner wrote that Davies was “wrong to say that 'Under current laws, including the Human Rights Act, anyone can come to the UK and make a claim for asylum.' The right to claim asylum is not contained in the Human Rights Act. It is in the 1951 Refugee Convention." 

In response to the 2015 refugee crisis Davies said that most of the people attempting to enter the UK via Calais were not refugees fleeing war, but were economic migrants "mostly young men, mostly with mobile phones, chancing their luck". Davies attracted media attention in October 2016 with a tweet suggesting refugees to the UK should have dental checks to determine their age. His view was criticised by the British Dental Association which issued a statement describing the test as "inaccurate, inappropriate and unethical". The suggestion was also criticised by the British Association of Social Workers, and the test was also ruled out by the Home Office. In October 2016, Davies said that a child migrant arriving in the UK from Calais had "lines around his eyes and looks older than I am." Davies appeared on ITV's Good Morning Britain on 19 October to defend dental checks, but became engaged in a heated exchange with Piers Morgan, who accused Davies of demonising refugee children, a charge which Davies denied. Later that year, Home Office figures revealed that more than two-thirds of refugees arriving in the UK who had their age assessed were over 18.

In August 2017, Davies criticised a senior Met officer for suggesting police should prioritise non-English speaking victims of crime for personal visits from officers. Davies described the suggestion as "appalling and discriminatory". When comedian Matt Lucas criticised Davies he responded by calling Lucas a "moron" and a "leftie luvvie".

Severn crossing
Davies has said that he had been persuaded that continuing with a private operator was not in the interests of bridge users, and has called on his own government to take state control of the two Severn crossings so motorists and businesses can enjoy VAT-free tolls on a permanent basis. Davies is quoted as saying: “In normal circumstances I would be happy for a private company to run the bridges, but it’s important to be pragmatic. It’s clear that if the bridges are run by a state body, motorists and businesses would not have to pay VAT at 20% to drive across. The crossings are vital for the Welsh economy, and it's important to get them down as much as possible."

Criticism of Velothon Wales
Davies strongly criticised the planning and organisation of the first Velothon Wales event to be run in Wales which passed through his constituency. This was due to the disruption to local businesses, and complaints from residents who would be trapped in their home all day.

Special constable
Davies was sworn in as a Special Constable with the British Transport Police in March 2007. On his third patrol he searched a man acting suspiciously and found a handgun.

In August 2011, Davies wrote about his experiences on riot duty and lamented that police were ordered not to go out alone in uniform due to the danger. Davies had to return from a short holiday for the recall of Parliament to discuss the riots across England and also served on patrols in London that week in his role as a special constable. He called for the police to be encouraged to take tougher action during the riots.

He was asked to resign in 2015 after serving nine years as a special constable due to new rules about police officers taking part in politics.

Controversy 

In January 2018, Davies was labelled as a 'transphobe' with views that were out of kilter with the Conservative Party's policy Tory LGBT group brands MP David TC Davies 'transphobe'

Honours and awards

References

External links
David Davies MP official constituency website
David Davies MP Conservative Party profile
David Davies MP Welsh Conservative Party profile

 Welsh Affairs Select Committee, House of Commons

Category:1970 births
Category:Living people
Category:Conservative Party Members of the National Assembly for Wales
Category:Conservative Party (UK) MPs for Welsh constituencies
Category:Monmouth, Wales
Category:People educated at Bassaleg School
Category:People from Monmouth, Wales
Category:UK MPs 2005–2010
Category:UK MPs 2010–2015
Category:UK MPs 2015–2017
Category:UK MPs 2017–2019
Category:UK MPs 2019–
Category:Wales AMs 1999–2003
Category:Wales AMs 2003–2007
Category:British special constables
Category:Welsh-speaking politicians