John Houghton (politician)

John Houghton MHK is a Member of the House of Keys for Douglas North and is currently Chairman of the Civil Service Commission. He is an outspoken critic of both the Isle of Man Constabulary and in particular its Chief Constable, Mike Culverhouse. Houghton was a former Commandant of the Special Constabulary and as such is a staunch ally of Manx Policeman and former DCC Kinrade especially. Houghton has been reprimanded or disciplined on a number of occasions by the President of Tynwald and the Speaker of the House of Keys for his unparliamentary language.

In 2009 he objected to and stated he would not support the Gender Recognition Bill as he believed new laws to protect the rights of transsexuals living on the Isle of Man would "defy common decency".

In 2011, during a 3-day Tynwald session he was accused a number of times of abusing his Tynwald privileges and for making verbal attacks on civil service officers.

In March 2012 he described an enquiry sent to all members of the Manx parliament from Manx Radio as to whether they would contribute towards their taxpayer funded Tynwald pension message as "arrogant", asked if they had nothing better to do and followed that up with a personal attack on the station.

It was announced on July 16, 2012, that he is to take over from Graham Creegen as Chairman of Isle of Man Water Auth.

In December 2014 it was discovered that out of the 24 MHK's he was the only one not paying into the Tynwald Members Pension Scheme despite an earlier statement to the contrary.

In May 2016 Mr Houghton was the subject of a parliamentary committee report brought before Tynwald due to accusations of "lying, bullying and interfering in a staff dispute". His behaviour was also described as ‘unrelenting, aggressive and unprecedented’ and led to a member of staff in the Clerk of Tynwald’s office resigning.

Houghton lost his seat in the general election held on 22 September 2016.