Oliver Colvile, Tory MP for Plymouth Sutton and Devonport who played cricket for Lords and Commons
Oliver Newton Colvile was born on August 26 1959. His father was a serving officer in the Royal Navy, he had a Plymouth-based uncle in the Royal Marines, and his grandfather had been an officer in the city’s naval barracks.
He was educated at Stowe, where a fascination with how an idea could become a law to protect civil liberties and enhance people’s freedom made him a Conservative. At 21 he went to work for the party, in the mid-1980s becoming agent at Mitcham and Morden for Angela Rumbold, who became the Home Office minister for prisons.
In a debate on crime, Colvile reminisced: “I visited Wandsworth prison, where staff were trying to get [the train robber] Ronnie Biggs to go back. When I asked what was happening, they said that they had his clothes and that they wanted him to go back and collect the stuff in person, which, of course, he eventually did.”
Acting as agent opened up contacts that led him into public relations. In 1993 he became an account director with Rowland Sallingbury Casey, and three years later he set up Oliver Colvile and Associates, handling community consultation for major regeneration projects.
Colvile first fought Plymouth Sutton in 2001, losing to its Labour MP Linda Gilroy by 7,517 votes; four years later he almost halved her majority. Prior to the 2010 election the boundaries were redrawn, and helped by a national swing to the Conservatives, Colvile defeated her by 1,149 votes.
At Westminster, he was put on the Northern Ireland Select Committee and became PPS to ministers at the MoD. He also became vice chairman of all party groups on the armed forces; pharmacy services; Zambia and Malawi; and Zimbabwe.
Five years on, Labour’s Luke Pollard cut Colvile’s majority to a nail-biting 523. When Mrs May replaced David Cameron in July 2016 and appointed James Brokenshire Northern Ireland Secretary, Colvile left the select committee to become his PPS.
The snap election Mrs May called for June 2017 opened unnervingly for Colvile when a message appeared on his Facebook page telling him “assassination was too good” for him and that he should jump off the Tamar Bridge. Colvile ignored the advice but went down to a heavy defeat.
Afterwards it transpired that the threatening message had been sent by Julian Isaacs, a 59-year-old Labour-supporting student at Exeter University, who was sentenced to 80 hours’ community service. Colvile was furious, saying: “It’s appalling. It’s a form of terrorism. He should be sent to prison.”
Out of Parliament, Colvile set out to connect business contacts he had made in Africa, the United States and around Europe with firms in the South-West. Based in Plymouth’s historic Stonehouse area, he also revived his marketing company specialising in regeneration and development opportunities. Two years on, he told a local journalist: “Politics can be a cruel arena and there is no sympathy for an ex-MP, but I’ve picked myself up, dusted myself down, and got back into the ring again.”
Oliver Colvile was unmarried.
Oliver Colvile, born August 26 1959, died October 20 2025
