High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Robert Michael James Gascoyne-Cecil, 7th Marquess of Salisbury, PC, DL (born 30 September 1946), is a British Conservative politician. During the 1990s, he was Leader of the House of Lords under his courtesy title of Viscount Cranborne. He lives in one of England`s largest historic houses, Hatfield House, which was built by an ancestor in the early 17th century, and is currently the Chancellor of the University of Hertfordshire.