Douglas Hurd
Former Conservative Foreign Secretary who questioned first-past-the-post in 1998.
Last refreshed: 10 April 2026
Why does the 2026 electoral reform debate invoke a Douglas Hurd speech from 1998?
Latest on Douglas Hurd
- Who is Douglas Hurd and what did he say about voting reform?
- Douglas Hurd, Baron Hurd of Westwell, was Conservative Foreign Secretary from 1989 to 1995. In 1998 he publicly questioned the Conservative Party's attachment to first-past-the-post, making him the last senior Conservative to do so before John Major's 2026 Attlee Foundation Lecture.Source: UK elections 2026 coverage
- Was Douglas Hurd Foreign Secretary under Thatcher or Major?
- Both. Douglas Hurd was appointed Foreign Secretary by Margaret Thatcher in 1989 and continued under John Major until 1995. He stood unsuccessfully for the Conservative leadership when Thatcher resigned in 1990.Source: Parliamentary records
- What happened at the 1990 Conservative leadership contest?
- Following Margaret Thatcher's resignation, Douglas Hurd and Michael Heseltine stood against John Major. Major won on the first ballot with 185 votes; Hurd received 56 and Heseltine 131. Hurd and Heseltine both withdrew.Source: Conservative Party leadership contest records
Background
Douglas Hurd, Baron Hurd of Westwell, served as Foreign Secretary from 1989 to 1995 under both Margaret Thatcher and John Major. A career diplomat before entering politics, he was one of the most substantive Foreign Policy figures of late 20th-century British Conservatism, steering UK policy through German reunification, the end of the Cold War, and the Balkans conflicts. In 1990 he stood unsuccessfully for the Conservative leadership after Thatcher's resignation, losing to Major.
Hurd is notable in the 2026 electoral reform debate because, in 1998, he questioned the Conservative Party's attachment to first-past-the-post (FPTP), making him the last senior Conservative before John Major's 2026 Attlee Foundation Lecture to publicly question the party's commitment to the voting system. Major's 2026 intervention was framed partly in terms of this rare precedent within Conservative ranks.
Hurd retired from frontline politics in 1995 and was created a life peer as Baron Hurd of Westwell. He has remained an occasional public commentator on foreign and constitutional affairs. His 1998 FPTP remarks were an isolated moment of heterodoxy in an otherwise deeply orthodox Conservative career, which is precisely why Major's 2026 revisiting of the question attracted such attention.