Ian C. Lucas

name = Ian Lucas }} Ian Colin Lucas (born 18 September 1960) is a British Labour Party politician, who has been the Member of Parliament for (MP) Wrexham since 2001. He was Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Business and Regulatory Reform in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills from 2009 until Labour's defeat at the 2010 General Election.
 * honorific-suffix =
 * image = Official portrait of Ian C. Lucas crop 2.jpg
 * office2 = Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Business and Regulatory Reform
 * term_start2 = 9 June 2009
 * term_end2 = 21 May 2010
 * predecessor2 = New position
 * successor2 = Baroness Wilcox
 * primeminister2 = Gordon Brown
 * office3 = Member of Parliament for Wrexham
 * parliament3 =
 * majority3 = 1,832 (5.2%)
 * predecessor3 = John Marek
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 * term_start3 = 7 June 2001
 * term_end3 =
 * birth_date = September 18, 1960
 * birth_place = Gateshead, County Durham, England
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 * nationality = British
 * spouse = Norah Lucas
 * party = Labour
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 * alma_mater = New College, Oxford
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Background
He was born and brought up in a council house in Gateshead, the second son of Colin and Alice Lucas. His father worked as a process engineer in a local factory, apart from serving in the army from 1942–1947 during the Second World War. He attended Greenwell Junior High School on Beacon Lough Road  in Gateshead then Newcastle Royal Grammar School, and won a place at New College, Oxford University, to study jurisprudence gaining a BA in 1982. He qualified from the College of Law in 1983 and gained a Solicitor's Admission in 1985. He is married with two children.

Professional career
He became a solicitor practising in London from 1983–6, but moved to Wrexham the 1986, specialising in criminal and personal injury law for Percy Hughes and Roberts in Chester until 1987. He worked for Lees Moore and Price in Birkenhead until 1989. He then worked for Roberts Moore Nicholas Jones until 1992 in Wrexham. In 1992 he moved the short distance to Oswestry in Shropshire working for Dr Crawford, and formed his own practice, Crawford Lucas in 1997. The move was precipitated because of disagreements with his old firm when he had organised protests against cuts in legal aid. He was a partner in Stevens Lucas from 2000–1.

After the death of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997, Ian Lucas represented Trevor Rees-Jones (Diana's bodyguard, and survivor of the crash) in a legal battle with Mohamed Al-Fayed.

Political career
In 1986 he joined the Labour Party, and became chairman of the Wrexham branch. He was on Gresford Community Council in Wrexham from 1987–91. He contested the traditionally conservative seat of North Shropshire in the 1997 general election, but was narrowly defeated. He has served as a school governor, and on a local hospital board.

He was later selected to stand for the UK Parliament in Wrexham, and won the seat in 2001.

In Parliament he has served as a member of the Environmental Audit Select Committee and the Transport Select Committee. He was Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Bill Rammell MP, Minister of State for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education. He has also taken an interest in sustainable energy, devolution of powers in Wales, and links with Germany.

He resigned as PPS on 6 September 2006, due to the refusal by Tony Blair to name a date for stepping down as Prime Minister. Fellow Welsh Labour MPs Wayne David and Mark Tami also resigned on the same day. Lucas is a member of both the Labour Friends of Israel and the Labour Friends of Palestine.

Lucas was promoted by Gordon Brown in the reshuffle of October 2008, to the role of assistant government whip. He then entered Government as a minister for the first time in the June 2009 reshuffle, becoming Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Business and Regulatory Reform in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and held that post until the Labour government left office in May 2010.

He was the Shadow Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Business and Regulatory Reform in the Official Opposition frontbench under Ed Miliband, and was the shadow minister for the Middle East and Africa.