WHO'S WHO
BIOGRAPHY
Richard Livsey was born on 2nd May 1935 and brought up in Talgarth, Breconshire. He still lives nearby at Llanfihangel Talyllyn. He holds an MSc in Agricultural Management from Reading University, joining ICI in 1961. Then he moved to Scotland between 1961 and 1962, and met his wife, Rene there, during a period when he worked as an Assistant Farm Manager on an ICI farm at Castle Douglas in Galloway. From 1962 to 1967, he was ICI’s Agricultural Development Officer in Northumberland.
He then left ICI, returned to Scotland, and moved on to become Farm Manager of the Blair Drummond Estate in Perthshire, where he fought his first election as a Liberal candidate for the Perth & East Perthshire seat. He remained in Scotland this time for four years from 1967 to 1971.
After returning to Wales to help found the Welsh Agricultural College at Aberystwyth, Richard became Senior Lecturer in Farm Management there from 1971 to 1985 and, with his wife Rene, they farmed their own 60-acre holding.
In 1985, Richard won the Brecon & Radnorshire by-election, his home constituency, for the first time, and joined Parliament’s Select Committee on Agriculture. He held the same seat in the 1987 General Election, subsequently becoming the Liberal Democrat spokesman on Wales, and held the position of Leader of the Party in Wales from 1988 to 1992. He was also a member of the Welsh Affairs Select Committee.
The General Election of 1992 was when Richard lost the Brecon & Radnorshire seat by the narrowest of margins – 130 votes – but he regained it again in 1997, with a 5,000 majority. Until 1995, he was Deputy Director, then Development Manager, of ATB-Landbase Cymru. Upon his return to the House of Commons following the 1997 Election, he became Liberal Democrat Shadow Secretary of State for Wales, heavily involved in the Devolution Settlement for Wales, until he stood down from Parliament in 2001, then becoming a Member of the House of Lords. Since he has been a Peer, Richard has joined the Party’s DEFRA team, speaking on Agricultural and Rural Affairs, and is a Member of the House of Lords European Environment and Rural Affairs Committee D. He has recently become President of the EU Movement in Wales.
Richard is President of Brecon & District Disabled Club, an associate of the British Vetinary Association, Board Member of Prime Cymru (50+ employment) and has been Treasurer (and now Trustee) of the Campaign for the Protection of Rural Wales, and Chairman of Brecon Jazz Festival. He is a Vice-President of Hay-on-Wye Literary Festival, Hon. Vice-President of Cor Meibion, Ystradgynlais, Patron of Brecon Cathedral Singers and President of Brecknock Federation of Young Farmers Clubs. Richard is a member of Talgarth Male Voice Choir, President of Talgarth Cricket Club, is a keen fly-fisherman, cyclist, cricketer, and Welsh Rugby supporter. He and Rene have three grown-up children – two sons and a daughter.
