David Miliband

The Right Honourable
David Miliband
MP
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs IncumbentAssumed office
28 June 2007Prime Minister Gordon BrownPreceded by Margaret Beckett Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural AffairsIn office
05 May 2006 – 27 June 2007Prime Minister Tony BlairPreceded by Margaret BeckettSucceeded by Hilary BennMember of Parliament
for South Shields IncumbentAssumed office
07 June 2001Preceded by David ClarkMajority 12,312 (41%) Born 15 July 1965(1965-07-15) (age 42)
London, England, United KingdomPolitical party LabourSpouse Louise Shackelton Alma mater Corpus Christi College, OxfordReligion AtheistWebsite davidmiliband.info

David Wright Miliband (born 15 July 1965) is a British politician who is the current Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs [1] and Member of Parliament for the constituency of South Shields, Tyne and Wear.

David's younger brother, the economist Ed Miliband, is the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, making the brothers the first siblings to serve together in Cabinet since Edward, Lord Stanley and his brother Oliver in 1938.

1 Early life
2 Member of Parliament
3 Personal life
4 References
5 External links

Early life

Family

Born in London, David Miliband is the elder son of Polish-born Marion Kozak and the late Belgian-born Marxist theoretician Ralph Miliband.

Both David's paternal grandparents lived in the Jewish quarter of Warsaw, before his grandfather, Samuel Miliband, joined the Red Army in the Polish-Soviet War, and after the war moved to Belgium. Hitler’s invasion of Belgium in May 1940 as part of the Nazis’ Western Offensive split the Miliband family in half: Ralph and father Samuel fled to England, while Ralph’s mother Renée and baby sister Nan stayed behind for the duration of the war. They were not reunited until 1950.[2]

Education

David Miliband was educated at schools in London, Benton Park School in Leeds and Boston, Massachusetts before being educated at Haverstock Comprehensive School in North London, where he obtained a Grade 'D' in Physics A-level, and 3 Grade 'B's.[3] He was admitted to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where he got a first in Philosophy, Politics and Economics. He then took a S.M. degree in Political Science in 1990 at MIT, where he was a Kennedy Scholar.

Policy advisor

As a child, his first career ambition was to be a bus conductor.[4] His actual first job was for the National Council for Voluntary Organisations. From 1989-94 he worked as a Research Fellow and policy analyst at the Institute for Public Policy Research and from 1992-4 was Secretary of the Commission on Social Justice. In 1994 Miliband became Tony Blair's Head of Policy and was a major contributor to Labour's manifesto for the 1997 general election. After Labour's victory in that election, Blair made him the de facto Head of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit, a position which he held until the 2001 election. He was given the nickname "Brains" by Alastair Campbell, after the Thunderbirds character.[5]

Member of Parliament

In the 2001 general election he was elected to Parliament for the Labour stronghold of South Shields.

After a year as a backbench MP he was appointed as Schools Minister, a junior minister in the Department for Education and Skills in June 2002. On 15 December 2004, in the reshuffle following the resignation of David Blunkett, he replaced Ruth Kelly as a Cabinet Office Minister.

Minister of State for Communities and Local Government

Following Labour's third consecutive election victory on May 6, 2005, he was promoted to the Cabinet as Minister of State for Communities and Local Government, a newly created cabinet post with responsibility for housing, planning, regeneration and local government. However Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, was officially in charge of these portfolios. Miliband was not given the title Secretary of State, although he was a full member of the Cabinet.

Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

On May 5, 2006 following the local elections Tony Blair made a major cabinet reshuffle [6] - his biggest since coming to power - in which Miliband replaced Margaret Beckett as Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Miliband has said he believes agriculture is important for Great Britain’s cultural heritage, economy and society and also for the environment. He has said disease control should be balanced with animal welfare. He attaches importance to reaching a “fair balance” between consumers, farmers, manufacturers and retailers. Miliband also believes the European Union and the World Trade Organisation affect power relations between British and foreign farmers.[7]

Foreign Secretary

On June 28, 2007, the day after Gordon Brown became Prime Minister, Miliband was appointed Foreign Secretary. He is Britain's third youngest Foreign Secretary and the youngest one since David Owen (in office 21 February 1977 – 4 May 1979). Anthony Eden was appointed to this office at the age of 37 in 1935.

On the morning of December 13, 2007, Miliband stood in for prime minister, Gordon Brown at the official signing ceremony in Lisbon of the EU Reform Treaty, which was attended by all other European heads of government. Brown was otherwise engaged at the House of Commons, appearing before the Liaison Committee, and travelled to Portugal to sign the treaty in the afternoon.[8]

Role within the Labour Party

Miliband has emphasised a generational division between himself and Blairites such as John Reid, Alan Milburn, Stephen Byers, John Hutton and Peter Mandelson, who are long-standing critics of Gordon Brown. Miliband is a "member" of the "Primrose Hill Gang", a loose network of Young Labour politicians and advisors that supposedly looks beyond Tony Blair and Gordon Brown for the future of the Labour Party. Other members of the group include Miliband's brother Ed Miliband, Douglas Alexander, Pat McFadden, James Purnell, Jim Murphy, Andy Burnham, Matthew Taylor, Geoff Mulgan and Patrick Diamond.

Miliband could be seen as a leader of a different set of "next generation" Blairite Ministers — a "Blairites for Brown" group — (who political commentators usually identify as Miliband, Andy Burnham, James Purnell and Liam Byrne, several of whom have already prospered under Brown). There is reported to be little difference between this group and Brownites of the same generation, notably Ed Miliband, and the husband and wife ministerial couple of Ed Balls and Yvette Cooper.

Miliband's support for Brown has been seen as an effort among his generation to prevent the Blairite/Brownite division continuing as some Labour party members see this division as having been more a product of personal historic rivalries arising from the 1994 leadership deal, rather than limited policy differences over public services. Political commentator Andrew Rawnsley of The Observer wrote in 2002 that "He is on the Left of the New Labour spectrum. He is a believer — in a way that Blair is not entirely — in Continental social democracy".[5]

Personal life

His wife, Louise Shackleton, is a violinist with the London Symphony Orchestra.[9] Shackleton and Miliband have adopted two sons in the United States, the first in December 2004 and the second in October 2007.[10]
He supports Premier League club Arsenal FC [5] and is President of South Shields FC.[11]

Blog

Miliband was the first British cabinet member to have a blog, although claims of excessive cost to taxpayer provoked some controversy.[12] On 18 August 2006, Miliband initiated the launch of a wiki. However, it was subsequently linked to by blogger Guido Fawkes, and mocked, after which further edits by guest users were temporarily prevented.[13]

Views

Organic food:

In January 2007 he sparked minor controversy by saying there was no evidence organic food was better than conventionally grown produce,[14] though he has since clarified he was referring specifically to health benefits.[15]

Solutions to tackle climate change:

Miliband has floated the idea of every citizen being issued with a "Carbon Credit Card" to improve personal carbon thrift. Miliband claims individuals have to be empowered to tackle global warming — "the mass mobilising movement of our age".[16]

Revived European Constitution:

On the July 3, 2007 during the Foreign Office Questions session in the House of Commons, he stated about William Hague, "The right hon. Gentleman's memory has deserted him. When he first entered this House, he worked with 11 other members of the current shadow Cabinet and 22 current Conservative Front Benchers to vote against a referendum on the Maastricht treaty, which involved a smaller transfer of power."

Religion and God:

Miliband has categorically stated that he does not believe in the existence of God.[17]

Environmental Record

Miliband is an advocate for international awareness of climate change who believes the cooperation of all nations to be needed for environmental reform. Miliband's focuses include food retail waste management and greenhouse gas emissions in agricultural industries.[18]

Miliband believes that the EU should go further in two areas: a low carbon global economy, and global action on climate change. He also wants Europe to increase its economic competitiveness. By switching over to a low carbon economy, he plans to tackle climate change. He hopes to ensure a stable price on energy by securing an energy source,[19] and has announced the Government's plans to legislate for carbon reductions at the United Nations General Assembly.[20]

In effort to put environmental reform into action, Miliband has developed a place for a collaborative "environmental contract" to be developed on a Defra (Department of Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs) Wiki site. Miliband's emphasis on the necessity of an entirely cooperative effort to effectively instigate a low carbon lifestyle worldwide has led him to create an open dialogue among citizens about environmental issues through web based blogging and in making speeches on the topic around the world.[21]

In February 2007, Miliband called for all 27 nations in the European Union to unify in backing proposals to cut harmful emissions by 30% by 2020.[22]

Books

Miliband has edited two books:

Paying for Inequality: Economic Cost of Social Justice (edited with Andrew Glyn), Rivers Oram Press, 1994, ISBN 978-1-85-489059-7
Reinventing the Left, Polity Press, 1994, ISBN 978-0-74-561391-8

Popularity

Miliband came top in a June 2008 poll showing which British politician gay men would most like to go a date with. He won with 39% of the vote, David Cameron came in second. [23]