Background
Robert Michael Maitland Stewart was born on 6 November 1906, the son of Robert Wallace Stewart and his wife, Eva.
Robert Michael Maitland Stewart was born on 6 November 1906, the son of Robert Wallace Stewart and his wife, Eva.
He was educated at Christs Hospital and then at St. John’s College, Oxford, where he became president of the Oxford Union in 1929.
In 1931 he began work as an assistant master at Merchant Taylors’ School in 1931, soon moved to the Coopers’ Company School, and then became a lecturer for the Workers’ Educational Association, where he remained until 1942. In 1942 he entered the Army Intelligence Corps, but transferred to the Army Educational Corps in 1943, where he was commissioned and promoted to the rank of captain.
Stewart revealed an interest in parliamentary politics in the 1930s, unsuccessfully contesting the West Lewisham seat for Labour in 1931 and 1935. He did win a seat as Labour M.R for Fulham East in 1945, Fulham in 1955, and Hammersmith Fulham in 1974, holding the latter until 1979. In the 1945 Labour government he became vice-chamberlain of His Majesty’s household (1946—1947) and comptroller of His Majesty’s household (1946-1947). From 1947 to 1951, he served as undersecretary of state for war. In May 1951, Attlee, the Labour leader and prime minister, appointed him parliamentary secretary to the Ministry of Supply; but Stewart’s tenure in this post ended with the collapse of the Labour government the following October.
With Labour out of office between 1951 and 1964, Stewart consolidated his position within the Labour Party. During this time he also joined the ranks of those opposed to Britain’s entry into the Common Market, in the debate that divided the Labour Party at the beginning of the 1960s. He rose quickly through the ministerial ranks after Harold Wilson formed his first Labour government in 1964. Stewart was appointed secretary of state for education and science in 1964, secretary of state for foreign affairs in January 1965, and secretary of state for economic affairs, in a straight swap with George Brown, in 1966, retaining the latter post until 1968. He again served as secretary of state for foreign and commonwealth affairs (FS) from March 1968 to June 1970. One of his major tasks as foreign secretary was to deal with the issues of white rule and national independence in Southern Rhodesia, Ian Smith having declared Rhodesian independence from the British Commonwealth and British control.
From 1975 to 1976, Stewart was a member of the European Parliament. In 1979 he became a life peer, as Baron Stewart of Fulham. He died on 10 March 1990.
He married Mary Elizabeth Birkinshaw in 1941.