*** Welcome to piglix ***

Frank Field (UK politician)

The Right Honourable
Frank Field
DL MP
Rt Hon Frank Field MP at 'Towards a Better Child Poverty Target'.jpg
Field speaking in 2012
Chairman of the Work and Pensions
Select Committee
Assumed office
18 June 2015
Preceded by Dame Anne Begg
Minister for Welfare Reform
In office
2 May 1997 – 28 July 1998
Prime Minister Tony Blair
Preceded by Peter Lilley
Succeeded by John Denham
Member of Parliament
for Birkenhead
Assumed office
3 May 1979
Preceded by Edmund Dell
Majority 25,514 (58.4%)
Personal details
Born (1942-07-16) 16 July 1942 (age 74)
Edmonton, Middlesex, England
Nationality English
Political party Labour
Alma mater University of Hull
Occupation Politician
Website www.frankfield.co.uk

Frank Ernest Field DL (born 16 July 1942) is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament for Birkenhead since 1979. From 1997 to 1998, he served as the Minister of Welfare Reform; he left the Government following differences with the Prime Minister, Tony Blair. Field went on to become one of the Labour government's most vocal critics from within the party on the backbenches.

Field has campaigned against poverty and low pay throughout his career. In June 2015 Field was elected Chair of the Work and Pensions Select Committee.

Field was born in London, the second of three sons. His father was a labourer in Morgan Crucible's factory in Battersea and his mother was a teaching assistant. His parents were Tories "who believed in character and pulling oneself up by one's own bootstraps".

Field was educated at St Clement Danes School which was then located in Hammersmith, before studying economics at the University of Hull. In his youth, he was a member of the Conservative Party but left because of his opposition to South Africa's apartheid system. In 1964, he became a further education teacher in Southwark and Hammersmith.

Field served as a councillor in the London Borough of Hounslow from 1964 to 1968. He was a Director of the Child Poverty Action Group 1969–79, and of the Low Pay Unit (a body that campaigned to ensure wages councils protected the rights of workers in certain industries) during 1974–80.


...
Wikipedia

...