Jeremy Corbyn facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Jeremy Corbyn
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Official portrait, 2020
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| Leader of the Opposition | |
| In office 12 September 2015 – 4 April 2020 |
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| Monarch | Elizabeth II |
| Prime Minister | |
| Preceded by | Harriet Harman |
| Succeeded by | Keir Starmer |
| Leader of the Labour Party | |
| In office 12 September 2015 – 4 April 2020 |
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| Deputy | Tom Watson |
| General Secretary |
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| Chairman |
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| Preceded by | Ed Miliband |
| Succeeded by | Keir Starmer |
| Member of Parliament for Islington North |
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| Assumed office 9 June 1983 |
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| Preceded by | Michael O'Halloran |
| Majority | 26,188 (48.7%) |
| Chair of the Stop the War Coalition | |
| In office 14 June 2011 – 12 September 2015 |
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| President | Tony Benn |
| Vice President | Lindsey German |
| Deputy | Chris Nineham |
| Preceded by | Andrew Murray |
| Succeeded by | Andrew Murray |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn
26 May 1949 Chippenham, Wiltshire, England |
| Political party | Labour (1965–present) |
| Spouses |
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| Children | 3 |
| Relatives | Piers Corbyn (brother) |
| Residences | Finsbury Park, London |
| Education | |
| Alma mater | North London Polytechnic (did not graduate) |
| Signature |  |
| a.^ | |
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (/ˈkɔːrbɪn/; born 26 May 1949) is a British politician who served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party from 2015 to 2020. On the political left of the Labour Party, Corbyn describes himself as a socialist. He has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Islington North since 1983. As of October 2020, Corbyn sits in the House of Commons as an independent, following the suspension of the whip.
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Early life
Corbyn was born at Chippenham Cottage Hospital in Chippenham, Wiltshire. He was raised in Kington St Michael in Wiltshire. The youngest of four sons, he is the brother of Piers Corbyn. His mother, Naomi Josling, was a math teacher. His father, David Benjamin Corbyn was an electrical engineer. His parents were peace activists. When Corbyn was seven, the family moved to Pave Lane in Shropshire, where his father bought Yew Tree Manor (renamed Yew Tree Guesthouse), turning it into a family home.
Corbyn studied at the Castle House Preparatory School near Newport, Shropshire. He then went to Adams' Grammar School. In school, Corbyn said that he received bad grades and his teacher told him that he was never going to make anything of himself. Corbyn worked as a reporter for a short time for local newspaper, the Newport and Market Drayton Advertiser. He went to the University of North London for a year before dropping out without an educational degree.
Political career
Corbyn joined the Labour Party as a teenager. In 1974, he was elected to Haringey Council and became Secretary of Hornsey Constituency Labour Party until being elected as the MP for Islington North in 1983; he has been reelected to the office nine times.
His activism has included roles in Anti-Fascist Action, the Anti-Apartheid Movement, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and advocating for a united Ireland and Palestinian statehood. A vocal opponent of the Iraq War, he chaired the Stop the War Coalition from 2011 to 2015, a period when he received the Gandhi International Peace Award; he also won the Seán MacBride Peace Prize in 2017.
Corbyn was elected Leader of the Labour Party in 2015. The party's membership increased sharply, both during the leadership campaign and following his election. Taking the party to the left, he advocated renationalising public utilities and railways, a less interventionist military policy, and reversals of austerity cuts to welfare and public services. Although critical of the European Union, he supported continued membership in the 2016 referendum. After Labour MPs sought to remove him in 2016 through a formal leadership challenge, he won a second leadership contest.
In 2019, after deadlock in Parliament over Brexit, Corbyn endorsed holding a referendum on the withdrawal agreement, with a personal stance of neutrality. In the 2019 general election, Labour's vote share fell to 32%, leading to a net loss of 60 seats and leaving it with 202, its fewest since 1935. Corbyn said he would not lead Labour into the next election.
During his tenure as leader, Corbyn came under criticism in relation to antisemitism within the Labour Party. Corbyn was suspended from Labour Party membership in October 2020. The membership suspension was lifted a month later. In March 2023, Labour's national executive committee resolved not to endorse Corbyn standing as a candidate in the next general election.
Policies and views
Economy and taxation
Corbyn supported a higher rate of income tax for the wealthiest in society. He also proposed the introduction of a £10 per hour living wage.
Corbyn has advocated an economic strategy based on investing-to-grow as opposed to making spending cuts.
Corbyn has been a consistent supporter of renationalising public utilities, such as the now-privatised British Rail and energy companies, back into public ownership.
National and constitutional issues
Corbyn is a longstanding supporter of a united Ireland. He would prefer Britain to become a republic, but has said that, given the Royal Family's popularity, "it's not a battle that I am fighting".
As Leader of the Opposition, Corbyn was one of the sponsors for the Constitutional Convention Bill, which was an attempt at codifying the UK's constitution, which has not been compiled into a single document.
Education
During the 2015 Labour leadership contest, Corbyn put forward a policy to scrap all tuition fees and restore student maintenance grants. The policy said that the British average student starts their working life with debts of £44,000 due to tuition costs and that university tuition is free in many northern European countries. The education changes were costed at £9.5 billion and would be funded by increasing taxes on the top 5 per cent of earners and increasing corporations tax.
Personal life
Corbyn lives in the Finsbury Park area of London. He has been married three times and divorced twice, and has three sons with his second wife. In 1974, he married his first wife, Jane Chapman, a fellow Labour Councillor for Haringey and now a professor at the University of Lincoln. They divorced in 1979. In the late 1970s, Corbyn had a brief relationship with Labour MP Diane Abbott.
In 1987, Corbyn married Chilean exile Claudia Bracchitta, granddaughter of Ricardo Bracchitta (Consul-General of Spain in Santiago), with whom he has three sons. He missed his youngest son's birth as he was lecturing National Union of Public Employees members at the same hospital. Following a difference of opinion about sending their son to a grammar school (Corbyn opposes selective education), they divorced in 1999 after two years of separation, although Corbyn said in June 2015 that he continues to "get on very well" with her. His son subsequently attended Queen Elizabeth's School, which had been his wife's first choice. Their second son, Sebastian, worked on his leadership campaign and was later employed as John McDonnell's Chief of Staff.
In 2012, Corbyn went to Mexico to marry his Mexican partner Laura Álvarez, who runs a fair trade coffee import business. A former human rights lawyer in Mexico, she first met Corbyn shortly after his divorce from Bracchitta. The couple maintained a long-distance relationship until Álvarez moved to London in 2011. They have a cat called El Gato ("The Cat" in Spanish), while Corbyn had previously owned a dog called Mango, described by The Observer in 1984 as his "only constant companion" at the time.
Personal beliefs and interests
Corbyn has described himself as frugal, "I don't spend a lot of money, I lead a very normal life, I ride a bicycle and I don't have a car." He has been a vegetarian for nearly 50 years.
Corbyn is a member of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Cycling. He enjoys reading and writing, and speaks fluent Spanish. He supports Arsenal FC, which is based in his constituency, and has signed parliamentary motions praising the successes of its men's and women's teams. He named Jens Lehmann, Ian Wright, and Dennis Bergkamp as his favourite Arsenal players, and has campaigned for the club to pay its staff a living wage. Corbyn is an avid "drain spotter" and has photographed decorative drain and manhole covers throughout the country.
Corbyn co-edited with Len McCluskey the anthology Poetry for the Many, published in November 2023 by OR Books.
Awards and recognition
In 2013, Corbyn was awarded the Gandhi International Peace Award for his "consistent efforts over a 30-year parliamentary career to uphold the Gandhian values of social justice and non‐violence". In the same year, he was honoured by the Grassroot Diplomat Initiative for his "ongoing support for a number of non-government organisations and civil causes". Corbyn has won the Parliamentary "Beard of the Year Award" a record six times, as well as being named as the Beard Liberation Front's Beard of the Year, having previously described his beard as "a form of dissent" against New Labour.
In 2016, Corbyn was the subject of a musical entitled Corbyn the Musical: The Motorcycle Diaries, written by journalists Rupert Myers and Bobby Friedman.
In 2017 the American magazine Foreign Policy named Corbyn in its Top 100 Global Thinkers list for that year "for inspiring a new generation to re-engage in politics". In December 2017 he was one of three recipients awarded the Seán MacBride Peace Prize "for his sustained and powerful political work for disarmament and peace". The award was announced the previous September.
In July 2023, a YouGov opinion poll found that Corbyn was the politician with the highest popularity (30%) in Britain.
Images for kids
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Corbyn in 2006
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Corbyn speaking at an anti-drone strike rally organised by the Stop the War Coalition in 2013
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Corbyn addressing London's People's Assembly Demonstration in June 2014
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A rally in Bristol during Corbyn's leadership campaign in 2016. Corbyn returned to College Green in 2019 for an election rally but his reception was then less enthusiastic.
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Corbyn speaking at the #StopTrident rally at Trafalgar Square on 27 February 2016
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Corbyn and Hilary Benn meet with President Obama in April 2016
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Corbyn at the 2016 Tolpuddle Martyrs' Festival
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Corbyn at a leadership election rally in August 2016
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Corbyn with members of his Shadow Cabinet in EventCity, Greater Manchester, at the Labour Party 2017 General Election Launch
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Corbyn in Shropshire in 2017, meeting local councillor Beryl Mason and former MEP David Hallam
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Corbyn launching the Labour Party's 2019 general election campaign
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Corbyn campaigning in the December 2019 general election at Nottingham Castle
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Corbyn in 2020
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Corbyn addresses the March Against Racism in Parliament Square, March 2022
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Corbyn spoke at a series of anti-Iraq War demonstrations
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Corbyn meets the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi in 2019
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Corbyn at a march for Palestine in Oxford in 2021
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See also
In Spanish: Jeremy Corbyn para niños
- List of peace activists
