Basil Reginald Vincent Ziani de Ferranti (2 July 1930 – 24 September 1988) was a
BritishThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
businessman and a
Conservative PartyThe Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
politician. He was educated at
EtonEton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....
and
Trinity College, CambridgeTrinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Trinity has more members than any other college in Cambridge or Oxford, with around 700 undergraduates, 430 graduates, and over 170 Fellows...
, and was the grandson of the electrical engineer and inventor
Sebastian de FerrantiSebastian Pietro Innocenzo Adhemar Ziani de Ferranti was an electrical engineer and inventor.-Personal life:...
.
He was an unsuccessful candidate at the
1955 general electionThe 1955 United Kingdom general election was held on 26 May 1955, four years after the previous general election. It resulted in a substantially increased majority of 60 for the Conservative government under new leader and prime minister Sir Anthony Eden against Labour Party, now in their 20th year...
in the
LabourThe Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
-held
Manchester ExchangeManchester Exchange was a parliamentary constituency in the city of Manchester. It returned one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, elected by the first past the post system....
constituency.
In 1958, he was elected to the
House of CommonsThe House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...
as
Member of ParliamentA Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for Morecambe and Lonsdale at a
by-electionA by-election is an election held to fill a political office that has become vacant between regularly scheduled elections....
, following the elevation to the peerage of the constituency's Conservative MP,
Ian FraserWilliam Jocelyn Ian Fraser, Baron Fraser of Lonsdale CH CBE, , known as Ian Fraser, was a British Conservative Party politician, a Governor of the BBC, a successful businessman and the first person to be awarded a life peerage under the Life Peerages Act 1958.Fraser was blinded in World War I and...
.
He held the seat at the
1959 general electionThis United Kingdom general election was held on 8 October 1959. It marked a third successive victory for the ruling Conservative Party, led by Harold Macmillan...
, but stood down from
ParliamentThe Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom, British Crown dependencies and British overseas territories, located in London...
at the
1964 electionThe United Kingdom general election of 1964 was held on 15 October 1964, more than five years after the preceding election, and thirteen years after the Conservative Party had retaken power...
. He had held ministerial office only briefly, as Parliamentary Secretary for Aviation from July to October 1962.
He later became a member (1973–1979) and chairman (1976–1978) of the European
Economic and Social CommitteeThe European Economic and Social Committee is a body of the European Union established in 1958. It is a consultative assembly composed of employers , employees and representatives of various other interests...
. He subsequently became a
Member of the European ParliamentA Member of the European Parliament is a person who has been elected to the European Parliament. The name of MEPs differ in different languages, with terms such as europarliamentarian or eurodeputy being common in Romance language-speaking areas.When the European Parliament was first established,...
(MEP), and a Vice President from 1979 to 1982. He represented the
Hampshire WestPrior to its uniform adoption of proportional representation in 1999, the United Kingdom used first-past-the-post for the European elections in England, Scotland and Wales...
constituency from 1979 to 1984, and
Hampshire CentralPrior to its uniform adoption of proportional representation in 1999, the United Kingdom used first-past-the-post for the European elections in England, Scotland and Wales...
from 1984 until his death.