Edmund Broughton Barnard

Sir Edmund Broughton Barnard OBE JP DL (16 February 1856 – 27 January 1930) was a British Liberal politician, landowner and sportsman.

Barnard was an original member of Hertfordshire County Council from 1888, serving on and chairing many different committees and becoming its chairman in 1920 and an Alderman. He was chairman of the County Council’s Education Committee and took a strong stand in favour of the retention of village schools, emphasising their importance to the preservation of village life. Barnard also served on Sawbridgeworth Urban District Council and was its chairman between 1905 and 1907.

He stood unsuccessfully for Parliament three times before getting elected. At the 1885 general election he was Liberal candidate in Epping; in 1886 he stood in Maldon and then in Kidderminster at the general election of 1900. After nursing the constituency for the next few years, he was finally elected at Kidderminster in the Liberal landslide victory of 1906 where his Conservative opponent was the future prime minister Stanley Baldwin. He did not contest Kidderminster in the general elections of January 1910 but fought the December General Election and came close to winning back his old seat. He seemed to have had a falling out with the Liberals over the prosecution of the First World War and the conduct of party politics in general as in 1917 he fought a by-election at Islington East for the National Party. He fought the 1918 general election for the same party at Hertford.

In 1904 Barnard was elected Chairman of the Metropolitan Water Board. He was sometime Chairman of the Lee Conservancy Board and the Thames Conservancy Board. In connection with this work he was appointed the first employers' chairman of the Joint Industrial Council for the Waterworks Undertakings Industry. He was sometime president of the Canal Association of Great Britain. He was a Justice of the Peace for both Essex and Hertfordshire and Chairman of Bishops Stortford Petty Sessions. Barnard was also sometime chairman of the Hertfordshire Agricultural Executive, chairman of the Board of Governors of The Bishops Stortford Secondary School for Girls. He was also a Deputy Lieutenant of Hertfordshire.[