Eric Graham Varley, Baron Varley, (11 August 1932 – 29 July 2008) was a British Labour Party politician and cabinet minister on the right-wing of the party. Early life Varley was born at 15 Poolsbrook Square, Poolsbrook, Staveley, near Chesterfield, Derbyshire, the son of Frank Varley, coalminer, and his wife Eva, née Goring. He attended the local secondary modern school after failing his eleven-plus but left at the age of fourteen in 1946. His mother was determined that he should not go down the pit, and he began his working life as an apprentice turner at Staveley iron works, before qualifying as an engineer's turner in 1952. If it had not been for his political predilections his career could have gone in an entirely different direction, since in his youth he was regarded as a first-rate soccer player, became a semi-professional, and was believed by experts to have the makings of a leading professional footballer. Political career He was active in the National Union of Mineworkers, and became a branch secretary of the union in 1955, joining the Labour Party the same year. After a period at Ruskin College, Varley won the NUM nomination to be the Labour candidate for his home town, where the sitting Labour Member of Parliament (MP) George Benson was retiring from Parliament. He was narrowly selected in June 1963 and duly held the Chesterfield seat in the 1964 election. Despite rebelling against the government's application to join the Common Market in 1967, Varley became an Assistant Whip later that year, and Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Prime Minister Harold Wilson in November 1968. He served briefly as a junior minister under Tony Benn at the Ministry of Technology from 1969. During the Labour Party's period of opposition in the early 1970s Varley was Chairman of the Trade Union Group of MPs, and became spokesman on fuel and power. Varley was appointed Secretary of State for Energy in March 1974 when Labour returned to power. The appointment of an NUM-sponsored MP helped the government end the NUM strike which had led the previous government to ration electricity to three days a week. Varley subsidised the National Coal Board and chose a British design for new nuclear power stations over an American rival. He also began the procedure to nationalise North Sea oil. During the Common Market referendum he advocated a 'No' vote but was not prominent