James Plaskitt
Encyclopedia
James Andrew Plaskitt is a British
Labour Party
politician who was the Member of Parliament
(MP) for Warwick and Leamington from 1997
until his defeat at the 2010 general election.
, Plaskitt was educated at the Pilgrim School (then a grammar school
that became a comprehensive upper school
in 1974 and closed down and now has the Pilgrims Pre-Preparatory School
on the former site and council offices) on Brickhill Drive in Brickhill
, Bedford and went up to University College, Oxford
to read PPE and gained an MA. He graduated in 1976 and subsequently took a MPhil
in Politics before taking up a lectureship at University College until 1979. He moved to Brunel University
for four years as a lecturer in Government and then to Christ Church, Oxford
from 1984-6 as a lecturer. From 1985 he was a business analyst for Oxford Analytica
.
. He was leader of the Labour group from 1990 to 1996. Plaskitt joined Oxford Analytica as a business consultant, and later became its consultancy director. In the 1992 general election
he contested Witney
for Labour, losing by a substantial margin to Conservative
former Foreign Secretary
Douglas Hurd
. As Labour were swept to power in the 1997 general election
landslide, Plaskitt was elected MP
for the previously Conservative constituency of Warwick
and Leamington Spa
, beating the incumbent Dudley Smith
into second place. He has served on the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee since 1999, and in the 2001 general election
was re-elected with an increased margin, although turnout
was lower. He is a strong supporter of reforming the law on assisted dying, tackling child poverty and expanding further education. He has spoken out against Israel's actions in Gaza and has called for urgent reform of international banking regulation. Plaskitt has tended to vote with the government on major issues such as university tuition fees
and foundation hospitals. He made clear that he would only ever support increases in university tuition fees which were matched by increases in Government grants for less well-off students, and he played a leading role in supporting Warwick Hospital's application for Trust status. He is notable among Labour MPs in that he did not vote for the 2003 invasion of Iraq
.
After the general election in May 2005
, he was appointed as a junior minister
in the Department for Work and Pensions
. He left the Government by mutual agreement in October 2008, and was re-appointed to the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee in July 2009. Plaskitt was one of 98 MPs who voted against the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act concerning MPs' addresses applying to Members of Parliament.
Mr Plaskitt lost out to the Conservative candidate, Chris White
in the 2010 general election by 3,513 votes, a swing to the Conservatives of 8.2%. The Leamington and Warwick constituency saw a very high 71% turnout.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
Labour Party
Labour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
politician who was the Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
(MP) for Warwick and Leamington from 1997
United Kingdom general election, 1997
The United Kingdom general election, 1997 was held on 1 May 1997, more than five years after the previous election on 9 April 1992, to elect 659 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party ended its 18 years in opposition under the leadership of Tony Blair, and won the general...
until his defeat at the 2010 general election.
Early life
Born in GrimsbyGrimsby
Grimsby is a seaport on the Humber Estuary in Lincolnshire, England. It has been the administrative centre of the unitary authority area of North East Lincolnshire since 1996...
, Plaskitt was educated at the Pilgrim School (then a grammar school
Grammar school
A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and some other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching classical languages but more recently an academically-oriented secondary school.The original purpose of mediaeval...
that became a comprehensive upper school
Upper school
Upper Schools tend to be schools within secondary education. Outside England, the term normally refers to a section of a larger school. There is some variation in the use of the term in England.-State Maintained Schools:...
in 1974 and closed down and now has the Pilgrims Pre-Preparatory School
Pilgrims Pre-Preparatory School
Pilgrims Pre-Preparatory School is a co-educational, Independent day school for children aged between 3 months and 8 years. The Little Pilgrims unit is a nursery school catering for children from the age of 3 months–3 years...
on the former site and council offices) on Brickhill Drive in Brickhill
Brickhill
Brickhill is a civil parish and electoral ward within northern Bedford in Bedfordshire, England.The boundaries of Brickhill are approximately Kimbolton Road to the east, Bedford Park and the old Bedford cemetery to the south, with Cemetery Hill and the Manton Heights Industrial Estate to the...
, Bedford and went up to University College, Oxford
University College, Oxford
.University College , is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. As of 2009 the college had an estimated financial endowment of £110m...
to read PPE and gained an MA. He graduated in 1976 and subsequently took a MPhil
Master of Philosophy
The Master of Philosophy is a postgraduate research degree.An M.Phil. is a lesser degree than a Doctor of Philosophy , but in many cases it is considered to be a more senior degree than a taught Master's degree, as it is often a thesis-only degree. In some instances, an M.Phil...
in Politics before taking up a lectureship at University College until 1979. He moved to Brunel University
Brunel University
Brunel University is a public research university located in Uxbridge, London, United Kingdom. The university is named after the Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel....
for four years as a lecturer in Government and then to Christ Church, Oxford
Christ Church, Oxford
Christ Church or house of Christ, and thus sometimes known as The House), is one of the largest constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England...
from 1984-6 as a lecturer. From 1985 he was a business analyst for Oxford Analytica
Oxford Analytica
Oxford Analytica is an international consulting firm providing strategic analysis of world events. It was founded in 1975 by David Young, an American employee of the National Security Council during the Nixon administration and one of the four in the Watergate scandal.Clients of Oxford Analytica...
.
Parliamentary career
His political career began in 1985 when he was elected to Oxfordshire County CouncilOxfordshire County Council
Oxfordshire County Council, established in 1889, is the county council, or upper-tier local authority, for the non-metropolitan county of Oxfordshire, in the South East of England, an elected body responsible for the most strategic local government services in the county.-History:County Councils...
. He was leader of the Labour group from 1990 to 1996. Plaskitt joined Oxford Analytica as a business consultant, and later became its consultancy director. In the 1992 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1992
The United Kingdom general election of 1992 was held on 9 April 1992, and was the fourth consecutive victory for the Conservative Party. This election result was one of the biggest surprises in 20th Century politics, as polling leading up to the day of the election showed Labour under leader Neil...
he contested Witney
Witney (UK Parliament constituency)
Witney is a county constituency in Oxfordshire represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election, and was created for the 1983 general election....
for Labour, losing by a substantial margin to Conservative
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
former Foreign Secretary
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, commonly referred to as the Foreign Secretary, is a senior member of Her Majesty's Government heading the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and regarded as one of the Great Offices of State...
Douglas Hurd
Douglas Hurd
Douglas Richard Hurd, Baron Hurd of Westwell, CH, CBE, PC , is a British Conservative politician and novelist, who served in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major between 1979 and his retirement in 1995....
. As Labour were swept to power in the 1997 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1997
The United Kingdom general election, 1997 was held on 1 May 1997, more than five years after the previous election on 9 April 1992, to elect 659 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party ended its 18 years in opposition under the leadership of Tony Blair, and won the general...
landslide, Plaskitt was elected MP
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for the previously Conservative constituency of Warwick
Warwick
Warwick is the county town of Warwickshire, England. The town lies upon the River Avon, south of Coventry and just west of Leamington Spa and Whitnash with which it is conjoined. As of the 2001 United Kingdom census, it had a population of 23,350...
and Leamington Spa
Leamington Spa
Royal Leamington Spa, commonly known as Leamington Spa or Leamington or Leam to locals, is a spa town in central Warwickshire, England. Formerly known as Leamington Priors, its expansion began following the popularisation of the medicinal qualities of its water by Dr Kerr in 1784, and by Dr Lambe...
, beating the incumbent Dudley Smith
Dudley Smith
Sir Dudley Gordon Smith is a British Conservative politician.Smith was educated at Chichester High School and became a journalist. He was elected a councillor on Middlesex County Council in 1958, then the youngest councillor, and became chief whip of the majority party.Smith contested Peckham in...
into second place. He has served on the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee since 1999, and in the 2001 general election
United Kingdom general election, 2001
The United Kingdom general election, 2001 was held on Thursday 7 June 2001 to elect 659 members to the British House of Commons. It was dubbed "the quiet landslide" by the media, as the Labour Party was re-elected with another landslide result and only suffered a net loss of 6 seats...
was re-elected with an increased margin, although turnout
Voter turnout
Voter turnout is the percentage of eligible voters who cast a ballot in an election . After increasing for many decades, there has been a trend of decreasing voter turnout in most established democracies since the 1960s...
was lower. He is a strong supporter of reforming the law on assisted dying, tackling child poverty and expanding further education. He has spoken out against Israel's actions in Gaza and has called for urgent reform of international banking regulation. Plaskitt has tended to vote with the government on major issues such as university tuition fees
Top-up fees
Tuition fees were first introduced across the entire United Kingdom in September 1998 as a means of funding tuition to undergraduate and postgraduate certificate students at universities, with students being required to pay up to £1,000 a year for tuition...
and foundation hospitals. He made clear that he would only ever support increases in university tuition fees which were matched by increases in Government grants for less well-off students, and he played a leading role in supporting Warwick Hospital's application for Trust status. He is notable among Labour MPs in that he did not vote for the 2003 invasion of Iraq
2003 invasion of Iraq
The 2003 invasion of Iraq , was the start of the conflict known as the Iraq War, or Operation Iraqi Freedom, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 21 days of major combat operations...
.
After the general election in May 2005
United Kingdom general election, 2005
The United Kingdom general election of 2005 was held on Thursday, 5 May 2005 to elect 646 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party under Tony Blair won its third consecutive victory, but with a majority of 66, reduced from 160....
, he was appointed as a junior minister
Parliamentary Secretary
A Parliamentary Secretary is a member of a Parliament in the Westminster system who assists a more senior minister with his or her duties.In the parliamentary systems of several Commonwealth countries, such as the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, it is customary for the prime minister to...
in the Department for Work and Pensions
Department for Work and Pensions
The Department for Work and Pensions is the largest government department in the United Kingdom, created on June 8, 2001 from the merger of the employment part of the Department for Education and Employment and the Department of Social Security and headed by the Secretary of State for Work and...
. He left the Government by mutual agreement in October 2008, and was re-appointed to the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee in July 2009. Plaskitt was one of 98 MPs who voted against the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act concerning MPs' addresses applying to Members of Parliament.
Mr Plaskitt lost out to the Conservative candidate, Chris White
Chris White (politician)
Christopher White is a British Conservative Party politician and the Member of Parliament for Warwick and Leamington, having won the seat at the 2010 general election.-Education:...
in the 2010 general election by 3,513 votes, a swing to the Conservatives of 8.2%. The Leamington and Warwick constituency saw a very high 71% turnout.