A Chocolate Soldier was a
Parliament
In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...
ary assistant for an
opposition front bench
In many parliaments and other similar assemblies, seating is typically arranged in banks or rows, with each political party or caucus grouped together. The spokespeople for each group will often sit at the front of their group, and are then kno ...
spokesman in the
House of Commons of the United Kingdom
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 memb ...
in the early 1970s, funded by the
Joseph Rowntree Social Service Trust
{{Use British English, date=January 2018
The four Rowntree Trusts are funded from the legacies of the Quaker chocolate entrepreneurs and social reformers Joseph Rowntree and
Benjamin Seebohm Rowntree. The trusts are based in the Rowntrees' home c ...
, which was endowed by the chocolate entrepreneur Joseph Rowntree.
The scheme was a pilot project to assist the opposition to carry out parliamentary duties and counteract the advantage that
government minister
A minister is a politician who heads a ministry, making and implementing decisions on policies in conjunction with the other ministers. In some jurisdictions the head of government is also a minister and is designated the ' prime minister', ' p ...
s enjoy through briefings from
civil servant
The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil service personnel hired rather than elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leadership. A civil service offic ...
s, and was instigated by the trust's secretary,
Pratap Chitnis. In 1974, the scheme was given official parliamentary support through the provision of
Short Money to opposition parties, announced by
Edward Short on 29 July 1974.
The Rowntree Trust made a similar fund available to the opposition in the late 1980s, to assist with travel expenses. This funding ceased in 1992, after the provision of Short Money was expanded to add a travel element.
Chocolate Soldiers
Many Chocolate Soldiers later made a significant contribution in the public sphere. Among the assistants funded by the Rowntree Trust were:
*
Matthew Oakeshott, assistant to
Roy Jenkins
Roy Harris Jenkins, Baron Jenkins of Hillhead (11 November 1920 – 5 January 2003) was a British politician and writer who served as the sixth President of the European Commission from 1977 to 1981. At various times a Member of Parliamen ...
*
Archy Kirkwood
Archibald Johnstone Kirkwood, Baron Kirkwood of Kirkhope, (born 22 April 1946), is a British Liberal Democrat politician.
Education
Kirkwood was educated at Cranhill Secondary School in Cranhill, Glasgow, and studied pharmacy at Heriot-Watt ...
''The Joseph Rowntree Inheritance, 1904-2004''
, p.11
Further reading
*Michael Pinto-Duschinsky, ''British Political Finance 1830-1980'', 1981, p. 197, American Enterprise Institute
The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, known simply as the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), is a center-right think tank based in Washington, D.C., that researches government, politics, economics, and social welfare ...
for Public Policy Research,
*Michael Pinto-Duschinsky, "Trends in British Political Funding 1979-1983", ''Parliamentary Affairs'', Summer 1985, Volume 38(3), p. 336, Hansard Society,
References
House of Commons of the United Kingdom
Political funding in the United Kingdom
{{UK-poli-stub