Ernie Roberts

For other people with similar names, see Ernest Roberts.

Ernest Alfred Cecil Roberts (20 April 1912 – 28 August 1994) was a British Labour Party politician.

Early life

Ernie Roberts left elementary school in Shrewsbury at the age of thirteen and was an engineering worker for many years until he became Assistant General Secretary of the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers in 1957. He was very much on the left wing of the Labour Party.

Political career

After unsuccessfully fighting Stockport South in United Kingdom general election, 1955, Roberts was elected Member of Parliament for the inner London constituency of Hackney North and Stoke Newington. He served from 1979 general election until 1987 general election, when he was deselected in favour of Diane Abbott.

Family

He married Joyce Langley in 1953, and had a son and two daughters.

Books

• Workers' Control (Allen & Unwin 1973)
• 労働者支配制 (Workers' Control Japanese edition) (1975)
• Unemployment - The Facts (Part-author) (Spokesman Books)
• Humanising the Work-place (Part-author) (Crook & Helm)
• The solution is Workers Control (pamphlet) (Spokesman Books)
• Democracy in the Engineering Union (Part-author) (IWC)
• Strike Back (Autobiography, with forewords by Tony Benn and Arthur Scargill) (1994)

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Ernie Roberts

Trade union offices
Preceded by Cecil Hallett	Assistant General Secretary of the Amalgamated Engineering Union 1957 – 1977	Succeeded by Bob Wright
Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by David Weitzman	Hackney North and Stoke Newington 1979–1987	Succeeded by Diane Abbott