Ian Christopher Austin, Baron Austin of Dudley (born 6 March 1965) is a British

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, ...

who sits as a

life peer In the United Kingdom, life peers are appointed members of the peerage whose titles cannot be inherited, in contrast to hereditary peers. In modern times, life peerages, always created at the rank of baron, are created under the Life Peerages ...

in the

House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminst ...

. He was the

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

(MP) for

Dudley North Dudley North may refer to: *Dudley North, 3rd Baron North (1581–1666), English nobleman and politician *Dudley North, 4th Baron North (1602–1677), English nobleman and politician, son of the above *Sir Dudley North (economist) (1641&ndas ...

from the 2005 general election until the 2019 general election when he stood down. Formerly a member of the Labour Party, he resigned from the party on 22 February 2019 to sit as an independent, and was ennobled in the

2019 Dissolution Honours The 2019 Dissolution Honours List was issued on 31 July 2020 following the 2019 United Kingdom general election the previous December, in which the Conservative Party won a large majority. This list was released concurrently with the 2020 Polit ...

. He served as

Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (or just Parliamentary Secretary, particularly in departments not led by a Secretary of State) is the lowest of three tiers of government minister in the UK government, immediately junior to a Minister ...

at the

Department for Communities and Local Government The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC), formerly the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG), is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for housing, communities, local governme ...

from 2009 to 2010.

Early life

Austin was born on 6 March 1965 and was adopted as a baby by

Dudley Dudley is a large market town and administrative centre in the county of West Midlands, England, southeast of Wolverhampton and northwest of Birmingham. Historically an exclave of Worcestershire, the town is the administrative centre of the ...

school teachers Fred and Margaret Austin. His adoptive father, Fred (a Czech

Jew Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""T ...

who was himself adopted by an English family on the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

invasion of Czechoslovakia), was head of The Dudley School from its formation in 1975 until his retirement in 1985. Fred Austin, born Fredi Stiller, was awarded the MBE in the

New Year's Honours List The New Year Honours is a part of the British honours system, with New Year's Day, 1 January, being marked by naming new members of orders of chivalry and recipients of other official honours. A number of other Commonwealth realms also mark this ...

for 2006 in recognition of his service to the communities of Dudley. Fred Austin died in March 2019 at the age of 90, four months after the death of his wife Margaret. Ian Austin's adoptive siblings are David Austin, the chief executive of the

British Board of Film Classification The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC, previously the British Board of Film Censors) is a non-governmental organisation founded by the British film industry in 1912 and responsible for the national classification and censorship of ...

, Helen, who is a nutritionist and former teacher, and Rebecca, who is one of Britain's leading midwives. Having failed the

eleven-plus The eleven-plus (11+) is a standardized examination administered to some students in England and Northern Ireland in their last year of primary education, which governs admission to grammar schools and other secondary schools which use academ ...

to attend King Edward's School, Birmingham, Austin was educated at

The Dudley School This article details a number of defunct schools that were once located in the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley. For details of currently operating schools in the area, please see: '' List of schools in Dudley''. The Blue Coat School Cradley High ...

from 1977 to 1983. He studied government and politics at the

University of Essex The University of Essex is a public research university in Essex, England. Established by royal charter in 1965, Essex is one of the original plate glass universities. Essex's shield consists of the ancient arms attributed to the Kingdom of Es ...

Journalism career

Austin was keen to obtain a

National Union of Journalists The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) is a trade union for journalists in the United Kingdom and Ireland. It was founded in 1907 and has 38,000 members. It is a member of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ). Structure There is ...

card and took a job with Black Country Publishing in Netherton where his personal interest in sport, especially cycling (he was chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Cycling Group) and football, led him to work as a journalist on ''Midland Sport Magazine''.

Political career

Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council

Austin was elected as a

councillor A councillor is an elected representative for a local government council in some countries. Canada Due to the control that the provinces have over their municipal governments, terms that councillors serve vary from province to province. Unl ...

in the

Metropolitan Borough of Dudley The Metropolitan Borough of Dudley is a metropolitan borough of West Midlands, England. It was created in 1974 following the Local Government Act 1972, through a merger of the existing Dudley County Borough with the municipal boroughs of Stour ...

in 1991, and served until 1995.

West Midlands Labour Party

In 1995 Austin then moved to become press officer for the West Midlands Labour Party until 1998.

Scottish Labour Party

In 1998, Austin spent a year as deputy director of communications for the

Scottish Labour Party Scottish Labour ( gd, Pàrtaidh Làbarach na h-Alba, sco, Scots Labour Pairty; officially the Scottish Labour Party) is a social democratic political party in Scotland. It is an autonomous section of the UK Labour Party. From their peak of ...

Office of the Chancellor of the Exchequer

Austin was appointed a political advisor to the

Chancellor of the Exchequer The chancellor of the Exchequer, often abbreviated to chancellor, is a senior minister of the Crown within the Government of the United Kingdom, and head of HM Treasury, His Majesty's Treasury. As one of the four Great Offices of State, the Ch ...

(later

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is ...

Gordon Brown James Gordon Brown (born 20 February 1951) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Labour Party from 2007 to 2010. He previously served as Chancellor of the Exchequer in Tony ...

, in 1999. He held the position until his election in 2005, and was known as one of Brown's closest lieutenants.

House of Commons

Austin was selected as the Labour candidate for

following the retirement of

Ross Cranston Sir Ross Frederick Cranston (born 23 July 1948) is a professor of Law at London School of Economics and a retired High Court judge. He is also a former British Labour Party politician, and served as the Member of Parliament for Dudley North be ...

, and was elected at the 2005 general election with a majority of 5,432. In June 2007, Austin was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Prime Minister to Gordon Brown, with a special provision to attend

cabinet Cabinet or The Cabinet may refer to: Furniture * Cabinetry, a box-shaped piece of furniture with doors and/or drawers * Display cabinet, a piece of furniture with one or more transparent glass sheets or transparent polycarbonate sheets * Filin ...

meetings. He was moved to a new position in the 2008 reshuffle, becoming an Assistant Whip for the Government. In the June 2009 reshuffle, he became

Parliamentary Under Secretary of State Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (or just Parliamentary Secretary, particularly in departments not led by a Secretary of State) is the lowest of three tiers of government minister in the UK government, immediately junior to a Minister ...

at the

and Minister for the West Midlands. Under

Ed Miliband Edward Samuel "Ed" Miliband (born 24 December 1969) is a British politician serving as Shadow Secretary of State for Climate Change and Net Zero since 2021. He has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Doncaster North since 2005. Miliba ...

, Austin served as Shadow Minister for Culture, Media and Sport between 2010 and 2011 and Shadow Minister for Work and Pensions between 2011 and 2013. In the 2015 Parliament, Austin joined the

Education Select Committee The Education Select Committee is a select committee of the House of Commons in the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The remit of the committee is to examine the expenditure, administration and policy of the Department for Education and any asso ...

, and was appointed as chair of the Labour Party's education committee.

Behaviour

Austin was reprimanded by the Speaker of the House of Commons for heckling during

Prime Minister's Questions Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs, officially known as Questions to the Prime Minister, while colloquially known as Prime Minister's Question Time) is a constitutional convention in the United Kingdom, currently held as a single session every W ...

on 18 October 2006, and he was subsequently described by

David Cameron David William Donald Cameron (born 9 October 1966) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2010 to 2016 and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2005 to 2016. He previously served as Leader o ...

as one of Gordon Brown's "boot boys". The following week he was rebuked again by the Speaker for comments made towards the

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

benches. On 1 June 2012, Austin apologised after falsely claiming a Palestinian

human rights Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hu ...

group, Friends of Al-Aqsa, had denied

the Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europ ...

happened in an article he wrote on the Labour Uncut website in 2011. He accepted the material of which he complained had been produced by an unconnected individual. In June 2014, Deputy Speaker Dawn Primarolo told Austin to apologise after he referred to Conservative MP Tobias Ellwood as an "idiot". In July 2016, Austin was reprimanded by the Speaker of the House of Commons for heckling Labour leader

Jeremy Corbyn Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (; 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 socialis ...

by shouting "sit down and shut up" and "you're a disgrace", as Corbyn criticised the

2003 invasion of Iraq The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a United States-led invasion of the Republic of Iraq and the first stage of the Iraq War. The invasion phase began on 19 March 2003 (air) and 20 March 2003 (ground) and lasted just over one month, including ...

in his response to the publication of the

Chilcot Inquiry The Iraq Inquiry (also referred to as the Chilcot Inquiry after its chairman, Sir John Chilcot)Ian Lavery. General Secretary

Jennie Formby Jennifer "Jennie" Formby (' Sandle; born 12 April 1960) is a British trade unionist and political figure who served as General Secretary of the Labour Party from 2018 to 2020. She was previously political director and south-east England regiona ...

dropped the inquiry in November, although Austin did receive a reprimand from the

Chief Whip The Chief Whip is a political leader whose task is to enforce the whipping system, which aims to ensure that legislators who are members of a political party attend and vote on legislation as the party leadership prescribes. United Kingdom ...

. On 17 March 2022, Austin and ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was f ...

'' apologised to former Jeremy Corbyn staffer,

Laura Murray Laura Beveridge (born 8 August 1988) is a Scottish professional golfer who plays on the Ladies European Tour. She competed as Laura Murray until she married PGA Golf Professional Keil Beveridge in October 2021. She was runner-up at the 2022 Est ...

, and agreed to pay her "substantial damages" (£40,000) for suggesting she was an “anti-Jewish racist” and part of the “vile anti-Semitism of Corbyn’s Labour”. They accepted there was no basis to the claims and that Ms Murray had infact "devoted significant time and energy to confronting and challenging antisemitism within the Labour Party".

Expenses

In May 2009, ''The Daily Telegraph'' reported that Austin had attempted to split a claim for

stamp duty Stamp duty is a tax that is levied on single property purchases or documents (including, historically, the majority of legal documents such as cheques, receipts, military commissions, marriage licences and land transactions). A physical reven ...

on buying his second home in London into two payments and tried to claim the cost back over two financial years. This allowed him to claim the majority of the money (£21,559, just £75 short of the maximum) under his second-home allowance in the 2005/06 financial year. He then claimed for the remaining £1,344 stamp duty cost in 2006–2007, together with his legal fees. In all, he went on to claim £22,076 (£34 short of the maximum) in the next financial year. Ian Austin MP

It also reported that Austin "flipped" his second-home designation weeks before buying a £270,000 London flat, and had claimed £467 for a stereo system for his constituency home, shortly before he changed his second-home designation to London. He then spent a further £2,800 furnishing the new London flat. Austin denied any wrongdoing, and defended his actions in an interview with local newspaper ''

Dudley News The Dudley News is a local free newspaper serving the Dudley area of the West Midlands, England. Only serving the town itself and surrounding communities, the Stourbridge and Halesowen areas of the Dudley Borough are served by the respective s ...

''.

Resignation from the Labour Party

On 22 February 2019, Austin resigned from the Labour Party over what he said was its 'culture of extremism, anti-Semitism and intolerance' and became an independent MP. His resignation was in the same week as The Independent Group had been formed, but Austin did not join, as he disagreed with their desire for another referendum on Brexit. On 19 March, MPs passed a motion put forward by Labour to remove Austin, as well as Independent Group MP Mike Gapes, from the seats on the

Foreign Affairs Select Committee The Foreign Affairs Select Committee is one of many Parliamentary select committees of the United Kingdom, select committees of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, British House of Commons, which scrutinises the expenditure, administration ...

they held as part of the Labour Party's allocation. Austin said Jeremy Corbyn wanted "to boot me off this committee because I stood up against racism", while Labour said it was right the party filled its allocation of seats on the committees. In July 2019, Austin was appointed Prime Ministerial Trade Envoy to

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

Theresa May Theresa Mary May, Lady May (; née Brasier; born 1 October 1956) is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2016 to 2019. She previously served in David Cameron's cab ...

. It was an unpaid and voluntary cross-party network, supporting UK trade and investment in global markets. In September 2019, Austin used his speech in the emergency debate proposed by Jeremy Corbyn to criticise him. Labour MP

Liz McInnes Elizabeth Anne McInnes (born 30 March 1959) is a British politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Heywood and Middleton from 2014 to 2019. A member of the Labour Party, she was a Shadow Minister for Foreign and Commonwealth Aff ...

, who was sitting on a backbench behind him, told him to "go sit somewhere else" in anger at his comments. Later in the month he attended the

Labour Party conference The Labour Party Conference is the annual conference of the British Labour Party. It is formally the supreme decision-making body of the party and is traditionally held in the final week of September, during the party conference season when th ...

with a large

mobile billboard A mobile billboard, also known as a "digital billboard truck", is a device used for advertising on the sides of a truck or trailer that is typically mobile. Mobile billboards are a form of transit media; static billboards, and mall/airport advert ...

stating Corbyn was unfit to lead the party or country. Later that month, outside the Labour Party conference Austin launched the

pressure group Advocacy groups, also known as interest groups, special interest groups, lobbying groups or pressure groups use various forms of advocacy in order to influence public opinion and ultimately policy. They play an important role in the develop ...

Mainstream UK, in front of a banner reading "Jeremy Corbyn: Unfit to Lead the Labour Party, Unfit to Lead the Country". The group described itself as "a new campaign designed to encourage a return to respectable and responsible politics, and to banish extremism from British politics once and for all". During the 2019 general election, Mainstream purchased targeted advertisements attacking Labour's taxation, spending, and nationalisation policies. In November 2019, Austin announced he would not stand in the December general election, and advised his constituents to vote for the

Conservative Party The Conservative Party is a name used by many political parties around the world. These political parties are generally right-wing though their exact ideologies can range from center-right to far-right. Political parties called The Conservative P ...

in order to stop

becoming Prime Minister. In December 2019, ten days before the general election, Labour supporters and members received a promotion on behalf of the Conservative and Unionist Party through the

Royal Mail , kw, Postya Riel, ga, An Post Ríoga , logo = Royal Mail.svg , logo_size = 250px , type = Public limited company , traded_as = , foundation = , founder = Henry VIII , location = London, England, UK , key_people = * Keith Williams ...

which was a letter from their formerly Labour MP. In the letter, Austin urged Labour voters to vote Conservative. The letter claimed the addresses had been obtained from the Register of Electors. Austin's successor, Conservative Marco Longhi, won the seat with a majority of 11,533, defeating the Labour candidate Melanie Dudley. This marked the first time a Labour candidate had lost an election in Dudley North since the seat's creation in 1997.

House of Lords

Austin was nominated for a life peerage in

Boris Johnson Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (; born 19 June 1964) is a British politician, writer and journalist who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2019 to 2022. He previously served as ...

's Dissolution Honours list in 2020, along with other prominent Corbyn critics Frank Field and John Woodcock, as well as Labour Leave-associated figures Kate Hoey and

Gisela Stuart Gisela Stuart, Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston (''née'' Gschaider; born 26 November 1955) is a British-German politician and life peer who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Birmingham Edgbaston from 1997 to 2017. A former member of the Lab ...

. He was created ''Baron Austin of Dudley, of Dudley in the County of West Midlands'' in the afternoon of 2 September 2020 and now sits as a non-affiliated life peer.

Political positions

In the Labour leadership election of 2010, Austin nominated

Ed Balls Edward Michael Balls (born 25 February 1967) is a British broadcaster, writer, economist, professor and former politician who served as Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families from 2007 to 2010, and as Shadow Chancellor of the Ex ...

, who came third. In 2013, Austin proposed the government share costs with parents in areas of poor educational attainment who wished to send their children to

private schools An independent school is independent in its finances and governance. Also known as private schools, non-governmental, privately funded, or non-state schools, they are not administered by local, state or national governments. In British En ...

. In October 2014, and again in December 2016, Austin called for greater action to limit immigration, and proposed a range of measures to achieve this, including tighter border controls, fingerprinting immigrants, deporting foreign criminals, reducing benefits entitlement, charging foreigners for NHS care, allowing only those who have lived or worked locally for two years on the housing list and measures to discourage the employment of immigrants rather than British citizens. In March 2018, Austin described Russia as "a fascist, homophobic dictatorship" and suggested the England team boycott the

2018 FIFA World Cup The 2018 FIFA World Cup was the 21st FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for men's national football teams organized by FIFA. It took place in Russia from 14 June to 15 July 2018, after the country was awarded the hosting righ ...

. Austin was a member of

Labour Friends of Israel Labour Friends of Israel (LFI) is a group in the Parliament of the United Kingdom that promotes support for a strong bilateral relationship between Britain and Israel, and seeks to strengthen ties between the British Labour Party and the Isra ...

. Jonathan Goldstein of the Jewish Leadership Council has called him a friend and ally.

Brexit

In 2013, Austin became one of the first Labour MPs to call for an in/out referendum on the UK's membership of the EU. He supported the UK remaining in the EU in the 2016 membership referendum, but was opposed to a second referendum. On 15 January 2019, Austin was one of only three Labour MPs to vote for Theresa May's Brexit deal in the

Meaningful vote Parliamentary votes on Brexit, sometimes referred to as "meaningful votes", were the parliamentary votes under the terms of Section 13 of the United Kingdom's European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, which requires the government of the United Ki ...

(along with Kevin Barron and John Mann). In the same series of votes, Austin was one of 14 Labour MPs who voted against his colleague

Yvette Cooper Yvette Cooper (born 20 March 1969) is a British politician serving as Shadow Home Secretary since 2021, and previously from 2011 to 2015. She served in Gordon Brown's Cabinet as Chief Secretary to the Treasury from 2008 to 2009 and Work and Pen ...

's amendment, which was designed to prevent a no-deal Brexit by extending the article 50 negotiating period.

References

External links

Ian Austin MP
''official website'' * {{DEFAULTSORT:Austin, Ian 1965 births Living people Alumni of the University of Essex Councillors in the West Midlands (county) Independent members of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom Life peers Labour Party (UK) officials Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies Labour Friends of Israel People educated at St James Academy, Dudley Parliamentary Private Secretaries to the Prime Minister UK MPs 2005–2010 UK MPs 2010–2015 UK MPs 2015–2017 UK MPs 2017–2019 Life peers created by Elizabeth II