Patrick Buchan-Hepburn, 1st Baron Hailes

Patrick George Thomas Buchan-Hepburn (2 April 1901 – 5 November 1974), created Baron Hailes in 1957, was a Conservative Party politician.

Born in Scotland, he was the youngest son of Sir Archibald Buchan-Hepburn, 4th Baronet. He moved to London where he became personal secretary to Winson Churchill. He unsuccessfully stood for parliament as a Conservative candidate in Wolverhampton at the 1929 general election.

In April 1930 a sitting member of the London County Council representing Kensington North, David Davis, died. Buchan-Hepburn was chosen by the Conservative-backed Municipal Reform Party to defend the seat, and was elected unopposed on 14 May 1930.

His membership of the county council was brief: in February 1931 he was elected to the House of Commons at a by-election for a Liverpool constituency. He stood down from the council at the next triennial election at the beginning of March 1931.

He remained a member of parliament until 1957, sitting as MP for Beckenham in the Kent suburbs of London from 1950. He Government Chief Whip and Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury from 1951-55. In 1957 he was raised to the peerage as Baron Hailes of Prestonkirk in the County of East Lothian and awarded the GBE in 1957.

In January 1958 the West Indies Federation was formed and Lord Hailes was appointed the first governor-general of the new state. He was to be the only person to hold the post, as the federation broke up in May 1962.