Born on September 14th 1938, the only son of John Verney, 20th Baron Willoughby de Broke. Verney was educated at Le Rosey in Switzerland and at New College, Oxford where he studied modern languages.
Verney succeeded to his father’s title in 1986 and was elected to remain in the House of Lords as a Conservative Peer. However, in 2007 he defected to UKIP and sits as a UKIP peer, making him one of three UKIP representatives in Westminster.
Since 1992, he has been Chairman of St Martin’s Theatre Company Ltd-the building of St Martin’s Theatre being commissioned by his grandfather. From 2002 to present, he has been a governor of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre and also from 2002 the president of the Warwickshire branch of the Campaign to Protect Rural England. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and of the Royal Geographical Society and as of 2006 the Deputy Lieutenant for Warwickshire.
In the Lords, Verny has introduced among other Bills, the Constitutional Reform Bill 2009-10. This bill intended to repeal the European communities Act 1972, repeal the Human Rights Act 1998, reduce the peers of the House of Commons and government, reduce MPs’ pay and give more power to local authorities.
More recently in 2012, Verney introduced the Referendum (European Union) Bill 2012-2013 to the House of Lord, to make provision for the holding of a referendum on the UK’s continued membership of the EU, on the same day as the General Election.
Incidentally, If you wish to see Lord Willoughby de Broke speak, he is speaking on Thursday, 6th March at 7PM, at Princess Alexandra Hall, Royal Over-Seas League, Over-Seas House 6 Park Place, St James’s Street, London SW1A 1LR. He is speaking alongside The Hon. Bernard Jenkin MP, Ruth Lea and John Mills at a Bruges Group meeting entitled ‘Europe, UKIP and the 2015 Election and Britain’s Place in a Changing World.’
Verney is married to Alexandra du Luart, granddaughter of Lord Butler of Saffron Walden but has two sons from his first marriage to Petra Aird. The heir apparent to his title is his eldest son, The Hon. Rupert Greville Verney.