Walter Ayles

{{Short description|British politician}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2017}} {{Use British English|date=January 2017}} {{Infobox officeholder | name = Walter Ayles | image = 1927 Walter Henry Ayles.jpg | alt = | caption = Ayles in 1927 by Lafayette © National Portrait Gallery | office = Member of Parliament<br />for Hayes and Harlington<br />{{nobold|Southall (1945–1950)}} | term_start = 26 July 1945 | term_end = 31 January 1953 | predecessor = ''Constituency established'' | successor = Arthur Skeffington | office1 = Member of Parliament<br />for Bristol North | term_start1 = 30 May 1929 | term_end1 = 27 October 1931 | predecessor1 = Frederick Guest | successor1 = Robert Bernays | term_start2 = 6 December 1923 | term_end2 = 29 October 1924 | predecessor2 = Henry Guest | successor2 = Frederick Guest | birth_date = {{Birth date|1879|4|24|df=y}} | birth_place = | death_date = {{Death date and age|1953|7|6|1879|4|24|df=y}} | death_place = | other_names = | known_for = | party = Labour | occupation = Politician }}

'''Walter Henry Ayles''' (24 March 1879 – 6 July 1953) was a British Labour Party politician who served as a Member of Parliament (MP) for 11 years between 1923 and 1953.

==Early life== Ayles was born in Lambeth into a poor religious family. At age 13 he became an engineering apprentice at the London and South Western Railway. Working in Birmingham he met Bertha Batt from Worle, Somerset, and they married in 1904 in Axbridge.<ref name=bp-20160416/>

==Political career== In 1910 Ayles became a full-time organiser for the Independent Labour Party in Bristol. He was elected a Councillor on Bristol City Council for the Easton ward in 1910. In 1913 he joined the committee responsible for running the Port of Bristol and Avonmouth Docks.<ref name=bp-20160416/>

Ayles was a Methodist lay-preacher and a temperance campaigner.<ref name=bp-20160416/>

One of the founding group of the No-Conscription Fellowship in November 1914, early in the First World War, he was a member of its national committee and a signatory of the ''Repeal the Act'' (Military Service Act 1916) leaflet, which resulted in the committee members being prosecuted under the Defence of the Realm Act, a number of them, including Ayles, being imprisoned for two months. He was also imprisoned as a conscientious objector, and served as secretary of the No More War Movement, 1931–1932.<ref name=bp-20160416>{{cite news |url=http://www.bristolpost.co.uk/conchie-bristol-man-jailed-refusing-fight-mp/story-29118809-detail/story.html |title=The Bristol MP jailed for refusing to go to war |author=Eugene Byrne |newspaper=Bristol Post |date=16 April 2016 |accessdate=16 February 2017}}</ref>

He had been selected by Bristol East ILP to be their candidate for the 1918 General Election. but was replaced prior to the campaign. He was Member of Parliament for Bristol North from 1923 to 1924 and from 1929 to 1931; for Southall from 1945 to 1950; and for Hayes and Harlington from 1950 until he resigned his seat, on account of failing health, on 31 January 1953, by accepting the post of Steward of the Manor of Northstead. Ayles died that July, aged 74.

Ayles Road, a street in Yeading, which formed part of his constituency, is named after him. Several nearby roads are also named after important people in the history of the Labour Party.<ref>{{cite book|last=Room|first=Adrian|title=The Street Names of England|pages=178|date=1992}}</ref>

== References == {{Reflist}} *{{Rayment-hc|date=March 2012}}

== External links == * {{Hansard-contribs | mr-walter-ayles | Walter Ayles }} *[http://www.brh.org.uk/site/articles/walter-ayles/ Walter Ayles], Bristol Radical History Group

{{s-start}} {{s-par|uk}} {{succession box | title = Member of Parliament for Bristol North | years = 1923–1924 | before = Henry Guest | after = Freddie Guest }} {{succession box | title = Member of Parliament for Bristol North | years = 1929–1931 | before = Freddie Guest | after = Robert Bernays }} {{s-new | constituency}} {{s-ttl | title = Member of Parliament for Southall | years = 1945–1950 }} {{s-aft | after = George Pargiter }} {{s-new | constituency}} {{s-ttl | title = Member of Parliament for Hayes and Harlington | years = 1950–1953 }} {{s-aft | after = Arthur Skeffington }} {{s-ppo}} {{succession box|title=South West member of the National Administrative Council of the Independent Labour Party|years=1914–1927|before=Geoffrey Ramsay|after=Fred Berriman}} {{s-end}} {{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ayles, Walter Henry}} Category:1879 births Category:1953 deaths Category:Amalgamated Engineering Union-sponsored MPs Category:British conscientious objectors Category:Councillors in Bristol Category:British Methodists Category:Independent Labour Party National Administrative Committee members Category:Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies Category:Politicians from the London Borough of Lambeth Category:UK MPs 1923–1924 Category:UK MPs 1929–1931 Category:UK MPs 1945–1950 Category:UK MPs 1950–1951 Category:UK MPs 1951–1955