Elystan Morgan, Baron Elystan-Morgan


Dafydd Elystan Elystan-Morgan, Baron Elystan-Morgan, known as Elystan Morgan, is a Welsh politician. He sat as a Crossbencher in the House of Lords from 1981 to 2020 and served as a Labour MP from 1966 to 1974.
Morgan was educated at Ardwyn Grammar School, Aberystwyth and the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth. He became a solicitor.
Originally a Plaid Cymru candidate, Morgan contested Wrexham three times, at the by-election in 1955, and at the general elections in 1955 and in 1959, and contested Merioneth at the general election in 1964.
Morgan joined the Labour Party and was elected Member of Parliament for Cardiganshire, Wales at the 1966 general election, and served as a junior minister from 1968 to 1970, as Under-Secretary at the Home Office He was chairman of the Welsh Parliamentary Labour Party between 1971 and 1974. In the February 1974 general election, Morgan lost his seat to the Liberal, Geraint Howells.
In 1979 he sought election as Labour candidate for Anglesey, following the retirement of Cledwyn Hughes, but was defeated by the Conservative, Keith Best. Following his defeat he largely withdrew from political life and concentrated on his legal career.
In 1959, Morgan married Alwen Roberts. They had two children, a daughter called Eleri born in 1960 and a son, Owain, born in 1962. Lady Elystan-Morgan died in 2006.
He was admitted to Gray's Inn in 1971, entitled to practise as a barrister. He was created a Life peer on 27 May 1981, with the title Baron Elystan-Morgan, of Aberteifi in the County of Dyfed. He held the office of Recorder between 1983 and 1987. He held the office of Circuit Judge between 1987 and 2003.
On 6 March 2007, Morgan supported the abolition of the blasphemy laws of the UK, quoting Richard Dawkins' description of God as "a petty, unjust, unforgiving control freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully". A deacon in the Presbyterian Church of Wales at Capel-y-Garn in Pen-y-garn, he was making the point that God did not need the protection of the law.
He retired from the House of Lords on 12 February 2020.

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