Книга: Chris Bryant «Parliament: The Biography: Volume 2: Reform»

Christopher John Bryant (born 11 January 1962) is a British Labour Party politician, who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Rhondda since 2001. Bryant is the former Minister for Europe and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

Background

Chris Bryant was born in Cardiff to a Scottish mother and a Welsh computer engineer father. Bryant grew up in Cardiff, Spain (where his father worked for five years)^[1][2] and Cheltenham.^[3] He was educated at Cheltenham College, where he was captain of the school swimming team, and Mansfield College, Oxford where he received a BA degree in English in 1983 and later received the MA (Oxon). He then trained to be a priest in the Church of England at Ripon College Cuddesdon in Oxfordshire, where he obtained a further degree in theology. Although initially a member of the Conservative Party, and an elected office-holder in the Oxford University Conservative Association, he joined the Labour Party in 1986 after leaving Oxford. From 1986 he served as a Curate at the Church of All Saints, High Wycombe and from 1989, as a Youth Chaplain in Peterborough, as well as travelling in Latin America.^[2]

Political career

In 1991 Bryant left the ordained ministry, after deciding that being gay and being a priest were incompatible. Statements made by Richard Harries, the then-Bishop of Oxford also influenced his decision.^[2] Bryant made a radical career move and began work as the election agent to the Holborn and St Pancras Constituency Labour Party, where he helped Frank Dobson hold his seat in the 1992 general election. From 1993 he was Local Government officer for the Labour Party; he lived in Hackney and was elected to Hackney Borough Council in 1993, serving until 1998. He became Chairman of the Christian Socialist Movement.^[2] He is also a member of the Labour Friends of Israel group. From 1994 to 1996 he was London manager of the charity Common Purpose.^[4]

In 1996 he became a full time author, writing biographies of Stafford Cripps and Glenda Jackson. He was Labour candidate for Wycombe in the 1997 general election (where he lost by 2,370 votes), and Head of European Affairs for the BBC from 1998.^[4] His selection for the very safe Labour seat of Rhondda in South Wales in 2000 surprised many people given Bryant's background – gay, a former Anglican vicar, and someone who had been a Conservative as a student. He says of his surprise selection "I fell off the chair, and my opponents certainly did". Fifty-two people applied for the candidature and a local councillor was hot favourite to win.^[2] He retained the seat comfortably with a 16,047 majority, one of the biggest in the country.

From 2004 unti 2007, Bryant was chair of the Labour Movement for Europe, succeeded by Mary Creagh MP.

On 5 September 2006 he and Siôn Simon co-ordinated a prominent letter which was signed by 15 Labour backbenchers calling for Tony Blair's immediate resignation.^[5]

Bryant was the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs Charlie Falconer. In Gordon Brown's autumn 2008 reshuffle, Bryant was promoted from his role as Parliamentary Private Secretary to Harriet Harman to the ministerial position of Deputy Leader of the House of Commons otherwise known as Parliamentary Secretary to the House of Commons. This was followed by another move in the June 2009 reshuffle, when he moved to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office as the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. On 13 October 2009, he was also appointed Minister for Europe.^[6] Following the defeat of the Labour government at the General Election of 2010, Bryant returned to the back benches. He stood as one of 49 candidates for election to the 19 places in the Shadow Cabinet in the internal Labour Party poll of October 2010. He polled 77 votes, reaching 29th position on the list. He is currently a shadow Justice Minister, with responsibility for political and constitutional reform.^[7]

Expenses claims scandal

Chris Bryant claimed over £92,000 in expenses over the five years leading up to the 2009 scandal over MPs' expenses. During that time he flipped his second-home expenses twice, claimed mortgage interest expenses that started at £7,800 per year before rising (after flipping) to £12,000 per year. He also claimed £6,400 in stamp duty and other fees on his most recent purchase, and £6,000 per year in service charges. A claim that he made for £58,493.26, almost three times the annual maximum, in 2004, was disallowed.^[8]

Social engineering comments

In October 2010, Chris Bryant described the coalition government's housing benefit reforms as poorer people "being socially engineered and sociologically cleansed out of London". The use of the term "ethnic cleansing" was criticised by members of the coalition, including Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, who called Bryant's comment "offensive to people who had witnessed ethnic cleansing in other parts of the world".^[9]

Personal life

Bryant is openly gay, and entered into a civil partnership with Jared Cranney on 27 March 2010. The ceremony was the first civil partnership ever held in the Houses of Parliament.^[2] Bryant lives in Porth in the Rhondda Fach.^[3] On 25 September 2006, The Guardian newspaper ran four spoof diary articles called "Chris Bryant's Manchester Diary". The newspaper later printed a clarification to confirm that these were parodies, and were not written by Bryant.^[10]

Media

He was ridiculed by the press in 2003 when he was discovered to have posed wearing only underpants on a gay dating site, Gaydar, whilst an MP.^{[11][12][13][14]} Bryant later reflected upon his photograph scandal, saying "It was a wound but it's a rather charming scar now. I had a period when I barely slept and it was horrible, but I'm very lucky in having a supportive set of friends – MP friends and others – and they looked after me." At the time, the media predicted that he would not survive, and there was much talk of his possible deselection.^[2]

In 2001 in the House of Commons, he criticised Prince Andrew, Duke of York for a number of alleged indiscretions.^[15].

Publications

• Glenda Jackson: The Biography by Chris Bryant, 1999, HarperCollins, ISBN 0-00-255911-0
• Stafford Cripps: The First Modern Chancellor by Chris Bryant, 1997, Hodder & Stoughton Ltd, ISBN 0-340-67892-5
• Possible Dreams: Personal History of the British Christian Socialists by Chris Bryant, 1996, Hodder & Stoughton Religious, ISBN 0-340-64201-7

References

1. ^ "Chris Bryant: You Ask The Questions". The Independent (London). 22 March 2010. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/chris-bryant-you-ask-the-questions-1925067.html. Retrieved 28 April 2010. 
2. ^ ^{a b c d e f g} Moss, Stephen (18 March 2010). "Chris Bryant: 'I don't think of myself as a gay MP'". The Guardian (London). http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/mar/18/chris-bryant-gay-mp-civil-partnership. Retrieved 28 April 2010. 
3. ^ ^{a b} http://www.chrisbryant.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5&Itemid=27
4. ^ ^{a b} Who's Who. A & C Black. January 2007. 
5. ^ "Minister joins Blair exit demands". BBC News. 5 September 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/5314632.stm. Retrieved 28 April 2010. 
6. ^ Webster, Philip (13 October 2009). "Brown downgrades Europe post in Cabinet reshuffle farce". The Times (London). http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6871302.ece#cid=OTC-RSS&attr=2015164. Retrieved 28 April 2010. 
7. ^ [1]
8. ^ Chris Bryant changed second home twice to claim £20,000: MPs' expenses Telegraph.co.uk
9. ^ "Clegg denies Labour's urban 'cleansing' claim"]. BBC News. 26 October 2010. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11627021. Retrieved 28 October 2010. 
10. ^ "Apology - Chris Bryant MP". The Guardian (London). 21 November 2006. http://www.guardian.co.uk/corrections/story/0,,1953293,00.html. Retrieved 28 April 2010. 
11. ^ "Reward for gay pants MP Bryant". The Sun (London). 6 October 2008. http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/1771888/Gay-pants-MP-Chris-Bryant-rewarded-as-he-is-appointed-Deputy-Leader-of-the-Commons.html. 
12. ^ "MP 'sorry' over underpants photo". BBC News. 2 December 2003. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/3256348.stm. Retrieved 28 April 2010. 
13. ^ MP faces being outed from Rhondda - WalesOnline
14. ^ "No Im the only gay in the valleys". The Sun (London). 21 May 2007. http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,43-2003552584,00.html. 
15. ^ http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2011/03/07/time-to-give-prince-andrew-order-of-the-boot-says-labour-mp-chris-bryant-115875-22971507/

External links

• Chris Bryant MP official constituency website
• Chris Bryant MP on Twitter
• Chris Bryant MP Welsh Labour Party profile
• Profile at Parliament of the United Kingdom
• Contributions in Parliament at Hansard 1803–2005
• Current session contributions in Parliament at Hansard
• Electoral history and profile at The Guardian
• Voting record at PublicWhip.org
• Record in Parliament at TheyWorkForYou.com
• Profile at Westminster Parliamentary Record
• Profile at BBC News Democracy Live
• Column archive at The Guardian
• Chris Bryant, Minister for Europe, London archived Foreign Office(FCO) blog
• Teenage Mums an online pamphlet by Chris Bryant MP
• Works by or about Chris Bryant in libraries (WorldCat catalog)