Member of Parliament
What position did T. P. O'Connor take between Jan 1910 and Feb 1910?
T . P . OConnor Thomas Power OConnor ( 5 October 1848 – 18 November 1929 ) , known as T . P . OConnor and occasionally as Tay Pay ( mimicking his own pronunciation of the initials T . P. ) , was a journalist , an Irish nationalist political figure , and a Member of Parliament ( MP ) in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland for nearly fifty years . Early life and education . OConnor was born in Athlone , County Westmeath , on 5 October 1848 . He was the eldest son of Thomas OConnor , an Athlone shopkeeper , and his wife Teresa Power , the daughter of a non-commissioned officer in the Connaught Rangers . He was educated at the College of the Immaculate Conception in Athlone , and Queens College Galway , where he won scholarships in history and modern languages and built up a reputation as an orator , serving as auditor of the colleges Literary and Debating Society . Career . OConnor entered journalism as a junior reporter on Saunders Newsletter , a Dublin journal , in 1867 . In 1870 , he moved to London , and was appointed a sub-editor on The Daily Telegraph , principally on account of the utility of his mastery of French and German in reportage of the Franco-Prussian War . He later became London correspondent for The New York Herald . He compiled the society magazine Mainly About People ( M.O.P. ) from 1898 to 1911 . OConnor was elected Member of Parliament for Galway Borough in the 1880 general election , as a representative of the Home Rule League ( which was under the leadership of William Shaw , though virtually led by Charles Stewart Parnell , who would win the partys leadership a short time later ) . At the next general election in 1885 , he was returned both for Galway and for the Liverpool Scotland constituencies , which had a large Irish population . He chose to sit for Liverpool , and represented that constituency in the House of Commons from 1885 until his death in 1929 . This was the only constituency outside the island of Ireland ever to return an Irish Nationalist Party MP . OConnor continued to be re-elected in Liverpool under this label unopposed in the 1918 , 1922 , 1923 , 1924 and 1929 general elections . From 1905 he belonged to the central leadership of the United Irish League . During much of his time in parliament , he wrote a nightly sketch of proceedings there for the Pall Mall Gazette . He became Father of the House of Commons , with unbroken service of 49 years 215 days . The Irish Nationalist Party ceased to exist effectively after the Sinn Féin landslide of 1918 , and thereafter OConnor effectively sat as an independent . On 13 April 1920 , OConnor warned the House of Commons that the death on hunger strike of Thomas Ashe would galvanise opinion in Ireland and unite all Irishmen in opposition to British rule . OConnor founded and was the first editor of several newspapers and journals : The Star ( 1887 ) , the Weekly Sun ( 1891 ) , The Sun ( 1893 ) , M.A.P . and T.P.s Weekly ( 1902 ) . In August 1906 and as Father of the House , OConnor was instrumental in the passing by Parliament of The Copyright Law for Music Act 1906 , known as the T.P . OConnor Bill , following many of the popular music writers at the time dying in poverty due to extensive piracy by gangs during the piracy crisis of sheet music in the early 20th century . The gangs would often buy a copy of the music at full price , copy it , and resell it , often at half the price of the original . The film Ill Be Your Sweetheart ( 1945 ) , commissioned by the British Ministry of Information , is based on the events of the day.He was appointed as the second President of the Board of Film Censors in 1916 and appeared in front of the Cinema Commission of Inquiry ( 1916 ) , set up by the National Council of Public Morals where he outlined the BBFCs position on protecting public morals by listing forty-three infractions , from the BBFC 1913–1915 reports , on why scenes in a film may be cut . He was appointed to the Privy Council by the first Labour government in 1924 . He was also a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Journalists , the worlds oldest journalists organisation . It continues to honour him by having a T.P . OConnor charity fund . Publications . - Lord Beaconsfield – A Biography ( 1879 ) ; - The Parnell Movement ( 1886 ) ; - Gladstones House of Commons ; Napoleon ; The Phantom Millions ; - Memoirs of an Old Parliamentarian ( 1929 ) . Personal life . In 1885 , OConnor married Elizabeth Paschal , a daughter of a Judge of the Supreme Court of Texas . Death . He died in London on 18 November 1929 and is buried at St Marys Catholic Cemetery , Kensal Green in north-west London . He was the last Father of the House to die as a sitting MP until Sir Gerald Kaufman in 2017 .