Christopher Newbury

Christopher Newbury (born 1956) is a British Conservative politician. He was a member of the Congress of the Council of Europe from 1998 to 2010 and since 2009 has been a member of the new Wiltshire Council created that year.

Newbury was educated at Gresham's School and Keble College, Oxford. In 1976, he represented the Oxford Union in the Observer Mace debating competition with Benazir Bhutto. In a Ravenscroft production of Macbeth, he played Macbeth opposite Guy Hands as Lady Macbeth.

Newbury was appointed to the UK Delegation to the Congress of the Council of Europe in 1998 and joined the European People's Party group. From 1999 he specialised in monitoring local democracy and observing elections, preparing Congress reports on local democracy in Bosnia and Herzegovina (2001 and 2006),Armenia (2003),Luxembourg (2004),Liechtenstein (2005),Serbia (2010) and Russia (2010).

His report on local and regional democracy in Russia (2010) recommended the reintroduction of direct elections for regional governors, making it possible to register new political parties "without the need to demonstrate an impractically large number of members", ending the use of closed lists in elections, and measures to deal with corruption.

In a report on Liechtenstein (2006), Newbury said the situation in Liechtenstein was "remarkable and indeed enviable".

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