Nigel Evans

Nigel Martin Evans (born 10 November 1957) is a British politician serving as the Member of Parliament (MP) for the Ribble Valley in Lancashire since 1992. A member of the Conservative Party, he was Joint Executive Secretary of the 1922 Committee from 2017 to 2019. He served as First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means, one of the Speaker's three deputies, from 2010 to 2013. He was elected as Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means in 2020.

He is a strong critic of the European Union and supported Brexit in the 2016 EU Referendum. He has since been supportive of Leave Means Leave, a Eurosceptic campaign group and backed Boris Johnson for Prime Minister.

Evans was born on 10 November 1957 in Swansea. He was educated locally at the Dynevor School, and at University College of Swansea, where he gained a Bachelor of Arts degree in politics in 1979. He was involved in the management of his family's newsagent's and convenience store in Swansea.

In 1985, Evans was elected as a councillor to the West Glamorgan County Council. In 1990, he became the deputy Conservative group leader, before standing down as a councillor in 1991. He contested Swansea West at the general election of 1987, but was defeated by former minister Alan Williams by 7,062 votes. He was selected to contest the 1989 Pontypridd by-election following the death of Brynmor John, the seat's Labour MP.

He was defeated by Kim Howells in Pontypridd by 10,794 votes. He fought his third election in one parliament when he was selected to contest the very safe Conservative seat of Ribble Valley, in the by election caused by the resignation of David Waddington, to become the Leader of the House of Lords in 1990, but was again defeated at the Ribble Valley by election on 7 March 1991, when Mike Carr gained the seat for the Liberal Democrats by 4,601 votes.

Evans won Ribble Valley from the Liberal Democrats at the general election of 1992, defeating Carr by 6,542 votes, and has remained the constituency's MP since then. He made his maiden speech on 20 May 1992. He was appointed as the Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to the Secretary of State for Employment David Hunt in 1993, and remained Hunt's PPS when he was appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in 1994. In 1995, Evans became the PPS to Tony Baldry the Minister of State at the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in 1995, and in 1996, he became the PPS to the new Secretary of State for Wales William Hague.

With the Conservative Party not winning a single seat in Wales at the general election of 1997, Evans was drafted onto the frontbench by John Major as a spokesman on Welsh Affairs. He became a member of the Shadow Cabinet under Iain Duncan Smith as the Shadow Secretary of State for Wales from 2001 to 2003. He had publicly criticised the government for not having a dedicated Secretary of State for Wales in a cabinet post, so when the new Conservative leader Michael Howard decided to take the role outside of the Shadow Cabinet, Evans chose to return to the backbenches.

He became a member of both the Trade and Industry the Welsh Affairs Select committees in 2003; and in November 2004, he was appointed a Vice-Chairman of the Conservative Party, with specific responsibility for overseeing Conservatives Abroad and mobilising the Conservative vote overseas. He returned to the back benches on the election of David Cameron in 2005, deciding to dedicate more time to his work on the Council of Europe and Western European Union. He has been a member of the Culture Media and Sport Select Committee since the general election of 2005.

On the issue of climate change, Evans has expressed his belief in the solar variation theory and the causes of warming on the earth and on other planets being sunspots, and praised the television documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle as "one of the best and most controversial programmes I've ever seen on television, particularly for those who don't like being spoonfed by Al Gore".

Evans voted against the introduction of the National Minimum Wage in 1999, by opposing the National Minimum Wage Act of 1998. He voted against every increase in the minimum wage thereafter, and in June 2009, became one of 11 MPs to back the Employment Opportunities Bill, which aimed to make the minimum wage optional, but was defeated in Parliament.

In November 2009, Evans was ranked as the 570th most expensive MP out of the 646 MPs in the UK Parliament. Criticism was drawn over his £375 a month expense on phone bills, and his purchase of four digital cameras in 18 months. Evans later drew criticism for saying that he struggled to live on his salary of over £64,000 per year. He said those comments were made in jest.

On 8 June 2010, Nigel Evans was elected First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means, and a Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons. This was the first time the three Deputy Speakers had been elected by secret ballot of all MPs. Evans supported Brexit in the 2016 European Union Referendum.

Evans is a supporter of the proposal to make 23 June a public holiday in the United Kingdom, to be known as British Independence Day. Following a Parliamentary debate on the topic, the announcement from the government of the United Kingdom to not proceed with the holiday at present, he said it was "a shame the government has made this decision, this is an absolute belter of an idea."

On 18 December 2010, Evans revealed to The Mail on Sunday that he was gay, saying that he was fed up with living his life as a lie.

On 4 May 2013, Evans was arrested on suspicion of rape and sexual assault. His trial began on 10 March 2014. He was acquitted of all charges on 10 April 2014. In 2012 he had supported large cuts to legal aid which became part of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO); in 2018, after losing his life savings defending himself in 2014, Evans said that the experience had shown him that "It's wrong, completely wrong, to remove people's right to have expert legal representation ... We’re definitely talking about justice being denied as a result of LASPO."