Chris Heaton-Harris

Christopher Heaton-Harris, (born 28 November 1967), is a British Conservative Party politician. He has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Daventry since May 2010, and was previously a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the East Midlands from 1999 to 2009.

Early life and education

Born in November 1967, Heaton-Harris attended the Tiffin Grammar School for Boys in Kingston upon Thames, before studying at Wolverhampton Polytechnic (now Wolverhampton University).

He went to work in the family business at New Covent Garden Market, before taking over from his father as Chairman of What4 Ltd, until his election to the European Parliament.

Political career

In the 1997 general election he stood in Leicester South, a safe seat for Labour. He was the Conservative party's candidate for that seat in the 2004 Leicester South by-election and came third to the Liberal Democrat Parmjit Singh Gill.

European Parliament

Heaton-Harris was elected to the European Parliament in 1999 as MEP for the East Midlands, and was re-elected in 2004.

European Parliament

The European Parliament (EP) is the directly elected parliamentary institution of the European Union (EU). Together with the Council of the European Union (the Council) and the European Commission, it exercises the legislative function of the EU. The Parliament is composed of 751 (previously 766) members, who represent the second largest democratic electorate in the world (after the Parliament of India) and the largest trans-national democratic electorate in the world (375 million eligible voters in 2009).

It has been directly elected every five years by universal suffrage since 1979. However, turnout at European Parliament elections has fallen consecutively at each election since that date, and has been under 50% since 1999. Turnout in 2014 stood at 42.54% of all European voters.

Although the European Parliament has legislative power that the Council and Commission do not possess, it does not formally possess legislative initiative, as most national parliaments of European Union member states do. The Parliament is the "first institution" of the EU (mentioned first in the treaties, having ceremonial precedence over all authority at European level), and shares equal legislative and budgetary powers with the Council (except in a few areas where the special legislative procedures apply). It likewise has equal control over the EU budget. Finally, the European Commission, the executive body of the EU, is accountable to Parliament. In particular, Parliament elects the President of the Commission, and approves (or rejects) the appointment of the Commission as a whole. It can subsequently force the Commission as a body to resign by adopting a motion of censure.

Chris

Chris is a short form of various names including Christopher, Christian, Christina, Christine, and Christos. Unlike these names, however, it does not indicate the person's gender although it is much more common for males to have this name than it is for females.

It is the preferred form of the full name of such notable individuals as Chris Tucker and Chris Penn. To find an article about one of these people, see List of all pages beginning with "Chris".

The word is also part of phrases, including Tropical Storm Chris, Ruth's Chris Steak House, and many more which refer to notable people, places, and things. For a list of these, see All pages with titles containing chris.

People with the given name

Sports Tonight

Sports Tonight was an Australian sports news and information program broadcast on Network Ten (and on its sister digital channel One), from 1993, until 2011.

At the end of its run, the program was broadcast on weeknights (on One) at 10.30 pm; at 11.00pm (on Ten combined with Ten Late News), Fridays at 12.00am (on Ten after the Late News), and on Sunday from 7:30pm AEDT (on One, though this sometimes varied due to live sports coverage or other programming). The program provided up-to-date sports scores and team and player information for all codes of football and different sports across Australia.

Broadcast History

The show ran from 1993 to 2011. From 1993 until 2005, the show ran for half an hour on each weeknight after Ten Late News. The two shows merged in 2006, but there was some criticism by viewers that Sports Tonight was not long enough and that it should have remained the same.

However, Sports Tonight was aired on Fridays as a separate program.

In 2011 the weekend 5:30pm editions of Sports Tonight normally seen on Network Ten were removed from those timeslots, due to the weekend news bulletins moving to 6pm. To compensate for this, a Sports Tonight-branded sports report were incorporated into these bulletins. This edition of Sports Tonight had been airing in the 5:30pm weekend slot since 2000. Thus, the only time Sports Tonight is aired on Network Ten is in the traditional late-night time slot with Ten Late News.