William Wade, Baron Wade of Chorlton

Sir William Oulton Wade, Baron Wade of Chorlton, JP (born 24 December 1932) is a British politician, businessman and agriculturalist.

Wade was educated at Birkenhead School and the Queen's University of Belfast. He was an elected member of Cheshire County Council between 1973–77, and then Joint Treasurer of the Conservative Party from 1982–90. He was elevated to the House of Lords as a life peer with the title Baron Wade of Chorlton, of Chester in the County of Cheshire in 1990. On 9 November 2007, he became an Honorary Graduand of the University of Chester where he was presented for admission to the degree of Doctor of Letters, honoris causa.

In the Lords, he has served as a Member of the Science and Technology Select Committee, and later as Chairman of the House of Lords Science and Technology Report ‘Chips for Everything’. He is a past Chair of the English Cheese Export Council 1982–84, and is President of the Combined Heat and Power Association. He became a Freeman of the City of London in 1980, and was knighted in 1982.