Tom Watson (politician)

Infobox MP


honorific-prefix =
name = Tom Watson
honorific-suffix = MP
office = Parliamentary Secretary at the Cabinet Office
term_start = 5 October 2008
term_end =
predecessor = Gillian Merron
successor =
primeminister = Gordon Brown
constituency_MP2 = West Bromwich East
parliament2 =
majority2 = 11,652 (32.8%)
predecessor2 = Peter Snape
successor2 = Incumbent
term_start2 = 7 June 2001
term_end2 =
birth_date = Birth date and age|1967|01|8|df=yes
birth_place =
death_date =
death_place =
nationality = British
spouse =
party = Labour
relations =
children =
residence =
alma_mater = University of Hull
occupation =
profession =
religion =


website =
footnotes =

Thomas Anthony Watson (born 8 January 1967) is a politician in the United Kingdom. He is Labour Party Member of Parliament (MP) for West Bromwich East, and was principally known for being the first MP to start a blog. Watson is currently a Parliamentary Secretary at the Cabinet Office.

Tom Watson was educated at King Charles I school, Kidderminster, and the University of Hull, where he was elected President of the Students Union in 1992. He was Chair of the National Organisation of Labour Students from 1992-1993. He then worked as a marketing officer and advertising account executive. In 1993, he began to work for the Labour Party as National Development Officer for Youth. He then worked on the party's 1997 general election campaign. He then went on to become National Political Officer of the AEEU trade union.

He was elected MP for West Bromwich East in 2001. In 2003, he included a weblog on his website. Attention was drawn to it by a page in which he parodied attempts by professional politicians to communicate with younger readers, entitled 'Teens!', which included such phrases as "We know that you're too busy fighting off your biological urges and being l33t hax0rs to Get Involved, but politics is cool, m'kay?". In 2004, he won the "New Statesman" New Media Award in the category of elected representative for using his weblog to further the democratic process.

Tom Watson was campaign organiser for the Labour Party in the Birmingham Hodge Hill by-election in July 2004, in which he succeeded in narrowly retaining the seat in difficult political times for the party.

Watson was appointed as an Assistant Government Whip on September 9, 2004 and was nominated as a Top Toadie by "The Guardian" Diary on January 6, 2005 [ [http://www.guardian.co.uk/diary/story/0,,1384084,00.html Guardian Unlimited - Marina Hyde's Diary] , retrieved 6th September 2006] . He was promoted on May 5, 2006 to the Ministry of Defence.

On September 5, 2006 it was reported that he had signed a letter to Tony Blair requesting that the Prime Minister resign to end the uncertainty over his succession. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/5314632.stm BBC News - Minister joins Blair exit demands] , retrieved 6th September 2006] . The Government Chief Whip, Jacqui Smith, told Watson that evening that he must either withdraw his signature to the letter, or resign his post.

On September 6, 2006, he resigned his ministerial position and released a further statement calling on Tony Blair to resign. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/5319328.stm BBC News - Blair under pressure to name day] , retrieved 6th September 2006]

From May 5 to September 6 2006, he was Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Ministry of Defence until he resigned from government after urging Tony Blair to resign.

Tony Blair was quoted by the BBC as saying that the statement and letter from Watson was 'disloyal, discourteous and wrong' and that he would be seeing Watson later in the day. He said that he had planned to dismiss Watson from Government for having signed the letter urging him to resign.

Within days of the incident suggestions appeared that Watson had been to Chancellor Gordon Brown's residence in Scotland only the day before the memo was sent to Tony Blair. Watson claimed he was dropping off a present for Brown's new baby Fraser, and that neither the issue of the note, nor "any politics" were discussed.fact|date=February 2007

As Watson recounted on his weblog, his reception at Labour Party Conference a few weeks after his resignation got a mixed reaction from Labour Party colleagues. Some sought him out to congratulate him, whilst others sought him out to be sarcastic or to be abusive. One such encounter was with Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott, who asked Watson, whilst he was waiting to be interviewed by Channel 4 News, if he was "going to resign again?"

Watson's actions, by his own admission on his weblog and elsewhere, angered many of his colleagues within the Labour Party, but also pleased many. He returned to government following Brown's appointment as Prime Minister in June 2007, in apparent contradiction of an promise made in 2006 never to do so. [ [http://www.order-order.com/2008/02/tom-watsons-ministry-of-untruths.html Tom Watson's Ministry of Untruths, Guido Fawkes blog, 6 Feb 2008] ]

Voting record

How Tom Watson voted on key issues since 2001 ( [http://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/tom_watson/west_bromwich_east They Work For You] ):

* Voted against a transparent Parliament.
* Voted for introducing a smoking ban.
* Voted for introducing ID cards.
* Voted for introducing foundation hospitals.
* Voted for introducing student top-up fees.
* Voted for Labour's anti-terrorism laws.
* Voted for the Iraq war.
* Voted against investigating the Iraq war.
* Voted for replacing Trident.
* Voted for the hunting ban.
* Voted for equal gay rights.

External links

* [http://www.tom-watson.co.uk/ Tom Watson] official blog
* [http://politics.guardian.co.uk/person/0,9290,-7104,00.html Guardian Unlimited Politics - Ask Aristotle: Tom Watson MP]
* [http://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/tom_watson/west_bromwich_east TheyWorkForYou.com - Tom Watson MP]
* [http://www.openrightsgroup.org/orgwiki/index.php/Tom_Watson_MP Open Rights Group - Tom Watson MP]
* [http://www.publicwhip.org.uk/mp.php?firstname=Tom&lastname=Watson&constituency=West+Bromwich+East The Public Whip - Tom Watson MP] voting record
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/5319854.stm Full text of resignation letter]

References