Mr. B.W. Biesheuvel

Barend Willem Biesheuvel was born on 5 April 1920 at Haarlemmerliede, a village between Amsterdam and Haarlem. After completing his secondary education at local schools, he graduated in law at the Free University of Amsterdam in September 1945.

For the next two years Mr Biesheuvel worked in Alkmaar as secretary to the Food Commissioner for the Province of North Holland. In 1947 he became secretary to the Foreign Division of the Agricultural Society (now the Agricultural Board). In 1952 Mr Biesheuvel became general secretary of the Dutch Protestant Farmers and Market Gardeners Union (CBTB) and in 1959 chairman of that organisation. From the same year he was also a member of the Agricultural Board, the Labour Foundation and the boards of the Centrale Raifeissen Bank and Heidemij.

Between 1956 and 1963 he represented the Anti-Revolutionary Party (ARP) in the Lower House of Parliament. From 1957 to 1961 he held a seat on the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe and from 1961 to 1963 in the European Parliament.

In the successive administrations headed by Marijnen, Cals and Zijlstra between 24 July 1963 and 5 April 1967 he was Deputy Prime Minister with additional responsibility for matters concerning Suriname and the Netherlands Antilles, and Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries.

In 1967 he returned to the Lower House and became leader of the parliamentary Anti-Revolutionary Party. During the same period he also chaired the Shipbuilding Board and the Committee on Government Information Reform.

Finally, from 6 July 1971 to 11 May 1973, Mr Biesheuvel was Prime Minister and Minister of General Affairs in the government that bore his name.

Following his political career, Mr Biesheuvel went on to occupy many other positions in the public and private sectors. Among other things, he was chairman of the supervisory board of the National Investment Bank, a member of the supervisory boards of OGEM and KLM, and chaired the working party on the Netherlands Antilles, the national advisory committee on the relationship between the electorate and policy-making, the Provisional Council for Transport, Public Works and Water Management and the Interministerial Coordinating Committee on North Sea Affairs (ICONA).

Mr. Biesheuvel died in Haarlem on 29 april 2001.