Irvine Patnick

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sir Cyril Irvine Patnick, known as Irvine Patnick, OBE (born 29 October 1929) is a British businessman and former Conservative Party politician.

He was educated in Sheffield at the Central Technical School followed by Sheffield Polytechnic. A building contractor, Irvine Patnick entered politics as a member of Sheffield City Council. He was elected as Member of Parliament for Sheffield Hallam in 1987. During his time as an MP he was a Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty's Treasury and deputy Chairman of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link Select Committee. He left politics after he lost his seat in the 1997 general election to the Liberal Democrat Richard Allan.

Patnick was one of the sources for the false allegations made against Liverpool F.C. supporters in The Sun newspaper's highly controversial coverage of the Hillsborough disaster. Although Patnick has often been described as as "unnamed Conservative MP from Sheffield" in accounts of the controversy, and Talk Sport radio announced in December 2006 that he was the "until now unnamed source" for the allegations, Patnick was in fact openely named as a source in the original Sun article in April 1989. Patnick was not actually present at the Hillsborough disaster, so it generally assumed that he was given misleading information by South Yorkshire Police. Patnick is not known to have ever apologised or commented publicly on his role in the controversy since.

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by John Osborn	Member of Parliament for Sheffield Hallam 1987–1997	Succeeded by Richard Allan