Samuel Laird Galbraith (18 October 1945 – 18 August 2014) was a Scottish politician and neurosurgeon who served as Minister for Environment, Sport and Culture from 2000 to 2001 and Minister for Children and Education from 1999 to 2000. Galbraith was a

Member of the Scottish Parliament Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP; gd, Ball Pàrlamaid na h-Alba, BPA; sco, Memmer o the Scots Pairliament, MSP) is the title given to any one of the 129 individuals elected to serve in the Scottish Parliament. Electoral system The ad ...

(MSP) for Strathkelvin and Bearsden from

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shootin ...

to 2001, and a Member of Parliament (MP) in the

British House of Commons The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. The House of Commons is an elected body consisting of 650 mem ...

for the equivalent seat from

1987 File:1987 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The MS Herald of Free Enterprise capsizes after leaving the Port of Zeebrugge in Belgium, killing 193; Northwest Airlines Flight 255 crashes after takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airport, k ...

to 2001. The Labour/ Liberal Democrat coalition faced demands from

Scottish National Party The Scottish National Party (SNP; sco, Scots National Pairty, gd, Pàrtaidh Nàiseanta na h-Alba ) is a Scottish nationalist and social democratic political party in Scotland. The SNP supports and campaigns for Scottish independence from ...

(SNP) politicians, including future First Minister

Nicola Sturgeon Nicola Ferguson Sturgeon (born 19 July 1970) is a Scottish politician serving as First Minister of Scotland and Leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP) since 2014. She is the first woman to hold either position. She has been a member of ...

, for Galbraith to resign after the

SQA examinations controversy The introduction in Scotland of the reformed examinations system in 2000 was criticised in the press and by the Government after a series of administrative and computer errors led to several thousand incorrect Higher (Scottish), Higher and Inter ...

in 2000.

Early life

Galbraith was born in Clitheroe, Lancashire, to Samuel Galbraith and Catherine Navi

He was educated at

Greenock Greenock (; sco, Greenock; gd, Grianaig, ) is a town and administrative centre in the Inverclyde council areas of Scotland, council area in Scotland, United Kingdom and a former burgh of barony, burgh within the Counties of Scotland, historic ...

High School. He studied at Glasgow University, where he received honours in medicine. Galbraith was a respected neurosurgeon, who worked at Glasgow's

Southern General Hospital The Southern General Hospital (SGH) was a large teaching hospital with an acute operational bed complement of approximately 900 beds. The hospital was located in Linthouse in the south west of Glasgow, Scotland. All facilities and services hav ...

Political career

At the 1987 general election, he was returned as Member of Parliament for the Strathkelvin and Bearsden constituency, and held the seat until standing down at the 2001 general election. He was a Scottish Office Minister between 1997 and 1999. Galbraith served as Minister for Children and Education in the Scottish Executive under Donald Dewar from 1999 to 2000 and then as Minister for Environment, Sport and Culture. On 20 March 2001 he announced his resignation from ministerial office and his parliamentary seats for health reasons.

Personal life

He was married in 1987 to Nicola Tennant, and they had three daughters, Mhairi, Heather and Fion

In prior years he was an avid Mountaineering, mountaineer who had climbed all the Munros and also climbed in the Alps and Himalayas. Galbraith received a lung transplant in 1990, at Freeman's Hospital Newcastle (where he continued to receive treatment), due to

fibrosing alveolitis Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), or (formerly) fibrosing alveolitis, is a rare, progressive illness of the respiratory system, characterized by the thickening and stiffening of lung tissue, associated with the formation of scar tissue. It is ...

, a condition that his elder sister died from. From 2006 he was chairman of the Scottish Maritime Museum with facilities at

Irvine, North Ayrshire Irvine ( ; sco, Irvin,
gd, Irbhinn, IPA: Dumbarton. North Ayrshire Councilbr>Committee reports and agenda
retrieved 22 July 2013. He died on 18 August 2014.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Galbraith, Sam 1945 births 2014 deaths Scottish Labour MPs Labour MSPs Ministers of the Scottish Government UK MPs 1987–1992 UK MPs 1992–1997 UK MPs 1997–2001 Members of the Scottish Parliament 1999–2003 Scottish surgeons Scottish neurosurgeons 20th-century Scottish medical doctors Lung transplant recipients People from Greenock Alumni of the University of Glasgow 20th-century surgeons