Welsh farm leaders pay tribute to 'friend and advocate' Lord John Morris

Tributes have been paid to Lord John Morris, who was instrumental in establishing the Farmers' Union of Wales (FUW) as a voice for Welsh farmers.

The former Cabinet minister and Welsh Labour MP Lord Morris of Aberavon has passed away at the age of 91.

Paying tribute, the FUW said Lord Morris helped establish the union as a 'recognised voice' for farmers in Wales.

The Labour Peer served as the union's deputy secretary general and legal advisor between 1955 and 1957.

He described those two years as “two of the most demanding years of my life, I promised to stay in Wales for 3 months, 3 months became a year, and a year became two”.

Lord Morris then went on to be elected as the Labour MP for Aberavon in Glamorgan at the 1959 general election.

The Labour Peer referred to a meeting at Chwilog Market, located in Gwynedd, in his book ‘Fifty years in Politics and the Law’.

He recalled hundreds of farmers gathering for a huge debate regarding establishing an independent agricultural union for Welsh farmers, and stated that he was proud to have organised it.

Paying tribute, FUW president Glyn Roberts said: “The FUW, Welsh farming and Wales as a whole have lost a great friend and advocate."

Mr Roberts said he remembered a conversation with Lord Morris when he said that in all his political and legal career the most exciting time was the meeting with potential union members at Chwilog.

The union was given three months to live by some critics. Lord Morris stated: “It gave me a lot of pleasure to attend the 50 years celebrations at Newtown in 2005, a rather longer life than the 3 months envisaged in 1955.”

He founded and edited the FUW's newspaper Y Tir, which continues to be published monthly, and travelled thousands of miles setting up union branches and giving legal advice to farmers.

Mr Roberts said that Lord Morris continued to communicate with the FUW on agricultural matters that arose in parliament throughout his political life.

In 1978, while serving as Secretary of State for Wales, Lord Morris secured the FUW’s formal recognition by government as independently representing the interests of farmers in Wales.

Mr Roberts said: “We will always remain indebted to Lord Morris for his early work in helping establish the FUW and for remaining a close friend of the union to the end.”

John Morris was MP for Aberavon from 1959 to 2001 and held positions in the governments of James Callaghan, Harold Wilson and Tony Blair.

From 1974 to 1979 he served as Secretary of State for Wales and was Attorney General from 1997 and 1999. He was made a life peer in 2001.

Before his death on 5 June 2023 he was the last surviving member of Harold Wilson’s 1974–76 cabinet, and the longest-serving Privy Counsellor.