Political groups

1999-2004: Group of the European Liberal, Democrat and Reform Party
2004-2014: Group of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe

National parties

1999-2014: Liberal Democrats

Biography

Andrew Nicholas Duff OBE was born in Birkenhead, United Kingdom. He was educated at St John's College, University of Cambridge and Université Libre de Bruxelles. He started his career as a City Councillor of Cambridge from 1982 to 1990. He initially stood for election to the European Parliament in the 1984 and 1989 European Parliament elections and won a seat in 1999. He would retain his seat in the 2004 and 2009 elections. Duff was Vice-President of the Liberal Democrats from 1994 to 1997.

During his time as MEP from July 1999 to June 2014, he was member of the Group of the European Liberal, Democrat and Reform Party (member of the Bureau from 2007 to 2009). He was also Vice-Chair (1999-2009) and member (2009-2014) of the Delegation to the EU-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee and a member of the Committee on Constitutional Affairs (1999-2004). Between October 2008 and November 2013, Andrew Duff was the President of the Union of European Federalists. In 2010, Duff co-founded with the Union of European Federalists the Spinelli Group, which he would later preside over.

Andrew Duff (second from the right) attends the 59th EU-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee Meeting - The European Parliament hosts members of the Turkish National Assembly in Brussels on 27 and 28 May 2008 © European Union 2008 - European Parliament

Andrew Duff became a spokesperson for the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe on Constitutional Affairs in 1999. He was a member of the Convention on the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Chairman of the Liberal caucus to the Convention on the Future of Europe. He also represented the European Parliament in the Intergovernmental Conference on the Treaty of Lisbon in 2007.

Duff is a Founding member of the European Council on Foreign Relations and is currently an Academic Fellow at the European Policy Centre. Before becoming an MEP, Andrew Duff was Director of the Federal Trust for Education and Research, London (1993-1999), as well as having previously worked for the Hansard Society for Parliamentary Government and the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust. He has published widely on the history and constitutional development of the European Union; among his publications is ‘Saving the European Union: the Logic of the Lisbon Treaty’ (2009).

Andrew Duff was awarded an OBE in 1997.

For more information on his time as an MEP, click here. 

Selected plenary speeches

On 14 March 2000, Andrew Duff, a member of the European Parliament's Committee on Constitutional Affairs (AFCO) and co-rapporteur of the draft Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, described some of the advances that this text contains for the integration of Europe:

On 18 June 2002, as a member of the European Parliament's Committee on Constitutional Affairs (AFCO) and a member of the Convention on the Future of Europe, Andrew Duff stressed the need to reach rapid agreement on the structure of the text of the future treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe:

On 23 June 2005, in response to the negative outcome of the referenda held in France and the Netherlands on the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, Andrew Duff, member of the European Parliament's Committee on Constitutional Affairs (AFCO), urged the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, President-in-Office of the Council of the European Union, to reaffirm his support for the Constitution; Duff, a member of the European Parliament's Committee on Constitutional Affairs (AFCO), is urging British Prime Minister Tony Blair, current President of the Council of the European Union, to revive the constitutional treaty, particularly as regards economic and social policies:

What's in the archives?

Most of the files under Andrew Duff’s lead concern his parliamentary work as rapporteur in the Committee on Constitutional Affairs and the Committee on Foreign Affairs and a member of the Delegation to the EU-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee. The main topics dealt with were the hearings during the 2004-2009 Commission election, the political situation in Cyprus and the meetings of Committee on Foreign Affairs from 2008 to 2009. In particular, the working documents of 19 Committee on Foreign Affairs and Committee on Constitutional Affairs reports as well as the files containing the notes and discussions leading to the approval of the Lisbon Treaty in 2007 are notable. Other documents are gathered under the headings 'Public figure' (including press articles, publications) and 'Political activities' (focusing on the European election campaigns in the UK).