Richard Livsey, Lord Livsey of Talgarth (1935-2010)

Richard Arthur Lloyd Livsey was born on 2 May 1935, the son of Arthur Norman Livsey, master mariner of Brecon who worked as a canal lock keeper, and Lilian Maisie (née James), a schoolteacher who later became a headmistress. His father died in Iraq in 1938 when Richard was just three years old, and consequently it was his mother who had a great personal in uence on his early development. He was educated at Talgarth County Primary School, Bedales School in Hampshire (a progressive independent school), Seale-Hayne Agricultural College, where he studied for a National Diploma in Agriculture, and later at Reading University, where he gained the degree of M.Sc. in agricultural management.

Richard Livsey had enjoyed a rich and varied life before entering the House of Commons in July 1985 at the age of fty. He had worked initially as a farm labourer at Bwlch in Carmarthenshire. In 1961, he had moved to Galloway in Scotland to work for a year as an Assistant Farm Manager on one of the company’s farms; this was when he met Rene, his future wife. He was then transferred to Northumberland where he worked as ICI’s agricultural development of cer for the next ve years. When Richard left ICI, it was to return to Scotland to become Farm Manager of the Blair Drummond Estate in Perthshire. He was then a senior lecturer in Farm Management at the Welsh Agricultural College, Llanbadarn Fawr, near Aberystwyth, from 1971 until 1985, initially under the leadership of Dr David Morris. Livsey had played an important role in setting up the pioneering college and thereafter in providing a wide range of exciting and innovative courses there. He and his wife also farmed some sixty acres of land at Llanon in Cardiganshire. He was later Deputy Director, subsequently Development Manager, at ATB-Landbase Cymru from 1992 until 1997, when he was not in parliament.

£3.00

or to access all content on this site, join today

For £35 a year you can access all lectures and articles on this site, attend lectures and receive our yearly Transactions

join today

If you are an existing member, you can access this lecture by logging in

login