Jane Kennedy (politician)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jane Elizabeth Kennedy (born 4 May 1958, as Jane Elizabeth Hodgson) is a Labour Party politician in the United Kingdom.
She was born in Cumbria and trained as a social worker at Liverpool University. She worked in social care for Liverpool City Council from 1979 to 1988 when she became a trade union organiser for the National Union of Public Employees. In this post she was prominent in the campaign to drive members of the Militant Tendency out of the labour movement.
[edit] Political career
Kennedy has been a Member of Parliament since the 1992 general election, when she was elected by the Liverpool Broadgreen constituency. She served as a member of the social security select committee from 1992 to 1994, and in 1995 she was appointed as an Labour whip.
Her constituency was abolished for the 1997 general election, but she was returned to Parliament for the new Liverpool Wavertree constituency.
After Labour's victory in the 1997 election, she served as an assistant government whip until 1998 and as a government whip until 1999, sitting on the House of Commons adminsttation select committee from 1997 to 1999.
She was then appointed as a Junior Minister in the Lord Chancellor's Department from 1999 until 2001, when she became a Minister of State in the Northern Ireland Office with responsibility for security and the justice system. After the suspension of the Northern Ireland Assembly in October 2002, she also became responsible for education and employment in the province. In 2003, she was made a Privy Councillor.
She transferred to the Department of Work and Pensions in 2004 and then to the Department of Health after the 2005 general election, remaining a Minister of State. She left the government on 5 May 2006 during a wide-ranging reshuffle. She was initially thought by journalists to have been sacked; however, she subsequently said she took the opportunity to resign from the government, in light of concerns about the impact of the government's policies on the National Health Service. [1]
Kennedy is a member of Labour Friends of Israel, and was the organsiation's chair from 1997 to 1998. She is also a member of the Ramblers' Association.
[edit] External links
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Terry Fields |
Member of Parliament for Liverpool Broadgreen 1992–1997 |
Succeeded by (constituency abolished) |
| Preceded by (new constituency) |
Member of Parliament for Liverpool Wavertree 1997 – present |
Incumbent |
