Mike German, Baron German
Michael James German, Baron German is a Welsh politician who was Deputy First Minister of Wales from 2000 to 2001 and 2002 to 2003 and Leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats in the National Assembly from 1999 to 2008 and overall Welsh Party leader between 2007 and 2008. The first-ever deputy first minister of Wales, he was also Minister for Economic Development from 2000 to 2001 and Minister for Rural Affairs and Wales Abroad from 2002 to 2003. He was elected to the National Assembly for Wales in 1999 where he was Assembly Member for South Wales East until 2010 and led his party group until 2008. In 2010, he was granted a life peerage and has since served in the House of Lords as a working peer for the Liberal Democrats. Ideologically, he is on the more liberal wing of his party.
German was born Michael James German in Cardiff, Wales. He studied at St Mary's College London, the Open University and the University of the West of England before working in a career of teaching until 1990. He joined the Liberal Party in the 1970s and was elected as the SDP–Liberal Alliance's candidate for the ward of Cathays at the 1983 Cardiff City Council election. In the council, he led the Alliance and its successor party the Liberal Democrats until 1995. He served as the co-leader of the council alongside Alun Michael of the Labour Party from 1987 to 1992 for the duration of a coalition between their parties and the Conservative Party. He also stood as his party's prospective parliamentary candidate for Cardiff North at the October 1974 general election and the 1979 general election, and for Cardiff Central at the 1983 general election and 1987 general election, failing to win on each occasion. From 1990 to 1999, he was also the head of the Welsh Joint Education Committee's unit in Europe. He was awarded an OBE in 1996 for public and political service.
In the 1997 Welsh devolution referendum, German led his party's campaign to support the creation of a devolved assembly for Wales, also becoming one of the leading campaigners for the successful cross-party Yes campaign. In 1998, he defeated Christine Humphreys in a leadership contest to become the leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrat Group in the National Assembly for Wales. At the first assembly election in 1999, German was elected as AM for South Wales East; he was re-elected at the 2003 assembly election and 2007 assembly election. He later won another leadership contest in 2007 to become the official party leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats, succeeding Öpik, before stepping down as leader a year later in 2008.
In the National Assembly, German led the Welsh Liberal Democrats in opposition from 1999 to 2000 and again from 2003 to 2008. In 2000, he negotiated and formed a coalition government with Labour's Rhodri Morgan and became Deputy First Minister and Minister for Economic Development. He stood down from the government in 2001 for the duration of a police investigation into allegations of financial misconduct during his time at the WJEC. He was cleared of wrongdoing in 2002 and returned to the government as the deputy first minister and the minister for rural affairs and Wales abroad. Labour ended its coalition with German's party after it made gains at the 2003 assembly election. Following the hung result of the 2007 assembly election, German tried to negotiate a coalition with Plaid Cymru and the Conservatives which failed to receive the endorsement of his own party, with Plaid choosing to form a coalition with Labour as a result. He remained in the assembly until 2010.
In 2010, German left the assembly after he was granted a life peerage in Gordon Brown's 2010 Dissolution Honours list. He has since been a member of the House of Lords as a working peer for the Liberal Democrats, where he has called for its abolition and replacement with an elected lower chamber. He was an opponent of the Rwanda asylum plan of Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak's Conservative governments and in 2024 led an unsuccessful attempt by Liberal Democrat peers to block the government's Safety of Rwanda Bill, which would overturn a court ruling that declared Rwanda an unsafe country for refugees and asylum seekers. He was a member of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee from 2020 to 2023 and has also chaired the Parliament Choir.
Early life and career
Michael James German was born on 8 May 1945 in Cardiff, Wales. He was educated at St Illtyd's College before going on to study at St Mary's College London and the Open University, where he gained a degree in educational studies, and the University of the West of England, where he gained a post graduate qualification in education management. Prior to his career in politics, German worked as a music teacher and became the head of music at two schools in Cardiff. In an interview with the South Wales Argus in 2019, he said he started participating in student activism during this period, claiming to have been elected as chair of his local branch of the Teacher's Association. In 1986, he was teaching at Lady Mary High School in Cardiff, where he later finished his teaching career as head of music. German retired from teaching in 1990 to serve as the European director at the Welsh Joint Education Committee, where he led its unit in Europe before leaving the organisation in May 1999. In this role, he was responsible for managing student exchange programmes between Wales and other countries in Europe.Early political career
German joined the Liberal Party in the 1970s. In an interview from 2019, he said he did so because he supported its goals of "social justice and fairness". In 1974, he stood as its prospective parliamentary candidate for Cardiff North in the October 1974 general election. He came third with 17.8% of the vote, behind Labour's J. Collins who won 35.7% of the vote and the Conservatives' Ian Grist who won 42.9% of the vote. He stood again at the 1979 general election, winning 13.5% behind Labour's M. D. Petrou with 36.2% and Grist with 47.3%. At the 1983 general election, he stood as the SDP–Liberal Alliance's Liberal candidate for Cardiff Central, where he came in second place behind Grist with 32.6% of the vote to Grist's 41.4%. He stood for the constituency again in the 1987 general election, falling to third place behind Labour's Jon Owen Jones with 29.3% of the vote to his 32.3%, with Grist again winning the seat with 37.1% of the vote. He was also the director of the Welsh Liberal Party's national campaign at the election, serving in the same position for the Welsh Liberal Democrats at the 1992 and 1997 general elections after the Liberals merged with the Social Democratic Party in 1988. Ideologically, German is on the more liberal wing of the Liberal Democrats.Cardiff City Council
In May 1983, German stood for election to Cardiff City Council as the Alliance's Liberal candidate for the ward of Cathays at the 1983 council election, a marginal ward with Labour. German campaigned on ending the council's practice of rubbish tipping, stating that it had damaged the environment, and on ending new green belt developments in areas on the outskirts of Cardiff like Pentwyn so that the council could focus more of its resources on regenerating deprived areas in the city centre. He was elected to the council with 1,742 votes, or 36.9% of the vote, alongside Alliance colleague Fred Hornblow and Labour's Derek Allinson. He was re-elected for a second term with Hornblow and Allinson at the 1987 council election with 1,992 votes, or 37.6% of the vote, and for a third term with them at the 1991 council election with 2,231 votes, or 41.7% of the vote. His wife Georgette German was also elected to the council in 1983 as a Liberal member for the ward of Plasnewydd.After his election to the council in 1983, German became leader of the three-member Liberal group in the council, which later became a four-member Alliance group later in the 1983–1987 term. He continued to serve as group leader of the Alliance and its successor party the Liberal Democrats until he stepped down from the council in 1995. After the 1983 election, German criticised the Conservative administration of Ron Watkiss for giving each of the Liberals just one seat in the council's different committees, with German occupying a seat on the land committee and his colleagues Georgette German and Fred Hornblow occupying a seat on the personnel committee and the licensing committee each. He said the members of his group should have been given seats on committees with remits that covered specific issues in their wards of Cathays and Plasnewydd and accused the Conservatives of having "gagged" his party on those issues, claims Watkiss denied.
At the 1987 council election, German led the Alliance on a platform of making the council more transparent by introducing measures such as increasing the number of questions members of the public can ask councillors during public sessions of the council. German also criticised the Conservative administration's housing policy, claiming that it might cause a housing crisis in the city. Ahead of the election, he said he thought the Alliance would win enough seats to hold the balance of power in a hung council. This prediction proved correct, with the Alliance increasing its share of seats from 4 to 12, while the Conservatives won 24 seats and Labour won 29, a hung result which gave the Alliance the balance of power in the new council. Following the election, German became the co-leader of the council, with his group serving in a coalition with both Labour and the Conservatives until 1991. The other co-leader of the council during this period was Alun Michael of the Labour Party, who had negotiated the coalition as Labour's chief whip in the council.
German led his party, by now the Liberal Democrats, into the 1991 council election. This time, he expected his party to fall short of winning enough seats to form an administration. The campaign had a low profile, with all three governing parties making little criticism of their opponents because of their coalition in the council except for in some marginal areas. German's Liberal Democrats mainly campaigned on the delayed construction of a leisure centre in Maindy. The Liberal Democrats were expected to lose some seats to Labour in Plasnewydd, though German's wife Georgette German was considered safe because of her local popularity. A close fight was expected between the two parties in Cathays, though German was not considered to be at risk, having established himself as a known national figure in the Liberal Democrats by this time. At the election, the Liberal Democrats' total seat share fell from 11 to 9, though the party did retain its seats in Cathays. It however failed to win the seat of the ward's incumbent Labour councillor Derek Allinson, who fought off a close challenge from the party to keep it for Labour. These were seen as good results for the party, which was at risk of losing more of its seats to Labour and the Conservatives. Commenting on the election results, German said the Liberal Democrats had been able to consolidate their position in the council and was now a "force to be reckoned with". Labour regained control of the council following the election. This was the last election to the council and therefore the last contested by German and his party. Cardiff City Council was abolished in 1996 and replaced by Cardiff County Council in the same year. He did not stand for election to the new council and decided to instead shift his attention toward the national structure of the Welsh Liberal Democrats.