History of Parliament Online

The History of Parliament’s oral history project is working with the British Library to create a sound archive of British politics since 1945. We plan to interview as many former Members of Parliament as possible on their careers and political experiences. We have now interviewed over 200 former MPs and 176 interviews have been deposited in the British Library.

The British Library’s Sound Archive are making those interviews that are open to the public available online. You can access the interviews available so far here with more being added in the coming months.

Parallel with the project, in 2012 Dods, publishers of Dods Parliamentary Companion who generously supported the project in its early years, commissioned Michael Waller-Bridge to create photographic portraits of some of those whom we interviewed. Since 2017, photographer Barbara Luckhurst has continued this work.

Featured on these pages are some of the former MPs who have now been interviewed. Photographs from Michael Waller-Bridge’s collection are featured in black and white, those from Barbara Luckhurst's collection are in colour, and other photographs displayed here in sepia were taken by our interviewers during the recording sessions.

Each page contains a brief biography, a brief clip from the interview as well as a full summary. Where available, a link is included to the British Library’s Sound Archive to hear the full recording. This archive is growing and as it does so more MPs will be added.

For more on our oral history project, and how you can get involved, see here.