Tom Sackville Explained

Honorific Prefix:The Honourable
Thomas Sackville
Office1:Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Security
Primeminister1:John Major
Term Start1:14 April 1992
Term End1:28 November 1995
Predecessor1:new appointment
Successor1:John Horam
Office:Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department
Primeminister:John Major
Term Start:28 November 1995
Term End:1 May 1997
Predecessor:Nicholas Baker
Successor:The Lord Williams of Mostyn
Office2:Lord Commissioner of the Treasury
Primeminister2:Margaret Thatcher
John Major
Term Start2:30 October 1989
Term End2:14 April 1992
Predecessor2:David Heathcoat-Amory
Successor2:Timothy Wood
Office3:Member of Parliament
for Bolton West
Term Start3:9 June 1983
Term End3:8 April 1997
Predecessor3:Ann Taylor
Successor3:Ruth Kelly
Parents:William Sackville, 10th Earl De La Warr
Anne Rachel Devas
Boards:FECRIS, Committee Against Cults, The Family Survival Trust
Birth Date:1950 10, df=yes

Thomas or Tom Geoffrey Sackville (born 26 October 1950) is a British Conservative politician and anti-cultist.

Family and early life

Sackville is the second son of William Sackville, 10th Earl De La Warr (died February 1988) and Anne Rachel Devas, and his brother is William Herbrand Sackville, the 11th Earl De La Warr.[1]

In 1979, he married Catherine Thérèsa Windsor-Lewis, daughter of Brigadier James Charles Windsor-Lewis.[1] They have two children, Arthur Michael Sackville (born 1983) and Savannah Elizabeth Sackville (born 1986), both adopted.[1]

He was privately educated at Eton College, and then studied at Lincoln College, Oxford. He began his professional career in merchant banking.[1]

Parliamentary career

Sackville first ran for Parliament in the constituency of Pontypool in the 1979 election, being beaten by Labour's Leo Abse.

He served as a Conservative Member of Parliament for Bolton West from the 1983 election until he was defeated by Ruth Kelly in the 1997 election. He held the office of Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State between 1992 and 1997, initially for the Department of Health, then as a Home Office minister between 1995 and 1997.[1]

Anti-cult activities

In 1985 he started All-Party Committee Against Cults[2] and 20 October 2000 he became first chairman of The Family Survival Trust (formerly Family, Action, Information, Rescue/Resource or FAIR), an anti-cult organisation.

In 1997 he ended government funding for the independent research group Information Network Focus on Religious Movements (INFORM), created by sociologist Eileen Barker. Funds were reinstated in 2000. In his article for The Spectator (2004) he accused INFORM and its president Eileen Barker of "refusing to criticise the worst excesses of cult leaders", and congratulated the Archbishop of Canterbury for declining to become a patron of INFORM. The allegations were described by INFORM as unfounded.

In 2005 he was elected as vice-president of European Federation of Centres of Research and Information on Sectarianism (FECRIS), an umbrella organization for anti-cult groups in Europe, and from 2009 he has served as its president.

Sackville is the current CEO of the International Federation of Health Plans.[3] He is also the current chairman of the trustees of the Family Survival Trust.[4]

See also

Notes and References

  1. Book: Burke's Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage . 107th . 1 . 1074 . 2003 . Charles . Mosley . 978-0971196629 . Cited in Web site: Darryl Roger . Lundy . Hon. Thomas Geoffrey Sackville . The Peerage . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20160307005023/http://www.thepeerage.com/p14304.htm#i143033 . 2016-03-07 .
  2. Regis Dericquebourg, A Case Study: FECRIS, Journal for the Study of Beliefs and Worldviews, 2012/2, p.188–189,
  3. Web site: Speakers Health Insurance Counter Fraud Group. hicfg.com. 2014-06-01.
  4. Web site: The Family Survival Trust - supporting victims of cults . 2022-08-02 . The Family Survival . en.