John Charles Hatch, Baron Hatch of Lusby (1 November 1917 – 11 October 1992) was a British author, broadcaster, lecturer and Labour Party politician. [1]
Hatch was born in Stockport, Lancashire but moved to Yorkshire at an early age. He attended Keighley Boys' Grammar School and Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. He subsequently became a tutor in Labour colleges and a lecturer at the University of Glasgow. [2]
Between 1950 and 1970 he served as Commonwealth correspondent for the New Statesman, [2] and developed a lifelong interest in African affairs, serving as a policy adviser to leaders such as Julius Nyerere and Kenneth Kaunda amongst others. [2] He was Commonwealth Secretary of the Labour Party during the 1950s, [2] [3] before becoming Director of the Extra-Mural Department of the University of Sierra Leone in 1961.
He was made a life peer on 5 May 1978 as Baron Hatch of Lusby of Oldfield in the County of West Yorkshire. [4]