Peter Blaker, Baron Blaker

Who was Peter Blaker, Baron Blaker?

Peter Allan Renshaw Blaker, Baron Blaker KCMG PC was an English Conservative politician.

Blaker was born in Hong Kong, son of Cedric Blaker. He was educated at Shrewsbury School before being evacuated to Canada in 1939. There he took a degree in classics, before being commissioned in the Canadian Army. On return to England he went to New College, Oxford. He qualified as a lawyer, and later joined the Foreign Office. In 1964 he was elected Member of Parliament for Blackpool South, which he represented until 1992. In Parliament, he served as a Minister for the Army, Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs. He was a Minister of State in the Ministry of Defence from 29 May 1981, until 9 June 1983. He was made a Privy Counsellor in 1983.

In 1994 he accepted a life peerage and became Baron Blaker, of Blackpool in the County of Lancaster and of Lindfield in the county of West Sussex. Blaker married Jennifer Dixon in 1953; they had a son and two daughters.