NOTE: Jess Phillips has since pulled out of the race. So, with her out of the race now I decided to post this early instead of in Feb when I originally planned. The other profiles will start being released in the second-half of Feb and into March. If any others drop out I will release their profile earlier as well.
Jess Phillips was one of the underdogs of the Labour leadership election and had originally performed surprisingly well in garnering nominations and supporters for her bid on the first requirement stage. She is the Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley where she was first elected as an MP in the 2015 General Election and has held the seat in the elections since. She has so far not held any senior positions within shadow government, which made her initial success in the leadership election more interesting.
Before becoming an MP she had been a known community activist which she was compelled to get into after she and her neighbors were victims to a series of arson attacks and anti-social behavior. She took action by holding community meetings, creating resident associations as well as finding funding for events and celebrations to make her community feel safe again.
Phillips also worked for a time with Women’s Aid Federation of England where she developed new refuges offering a home to woman and children fleeing violence. She also created a new sexual exploitation support service for children as well as a home for victims of human trafficking. During her time in the charity, the services that her and her colleagues created have supported thousands of women and children.
The now MP has said that her time advocating against sexual violence and domestic abuse left her subject to much abuse herself from social media and emails which was mostly from men and she said that she has seen off angry perpetrators at her door as well in the past.
she was elected as a councillor in the 2012 local elections and served on the Birmingham City Council as victims’ champion due to her community activism. In this post she lobbied police and criminal justice organizations on behalf of victims.
She eventually went on to contest the seat of Birmingham Yardley and was selected as the Labour candidate in the 2015 General Election from an all-women’s shortlist. Her campaign was centered around jobs, homelessness and improving the response to victims of domestic and sexual violence as well as abuse in all forms. She went on to win the seat from the Lib Dems.
Jess Phillips supported and nominated Yvette Cooper as leader and Tom Watson as Deputy leader in the 2015 Labour Leadership Election. After Corbyn was elected she criticized him for not appointing a woman to any significant positions within his first shadow cabinet. She has also said that she wanted Corbyn to do more on improving the polls and that it may have given her more confidence that Corbyn was about the country rather than just about him and his project.
Phillips has called herself a “stanch Socialist” and wants to see Labour winning elections again. She has also said that she believes Corbyn didn’t go at it hard or at all in Commons debates and Phillips was also disapproving of Corbyn’s inner circle, even saying that she would like to see Angela Eagle take over John McDonnel’s job of Shadow Chancellor any day as she would do a better job.
If Labour were to win an election Phillips has said in the past that she would be interested in having the job of Home Secretary. Her childhood ambition was to be Prime Minister one day but she has also revealed more recently another childhood ambition of being world queen. The MP has long had a reputation now of saying what she is thinking unlike many other MPs and has even used some colourful language in many of her interviews for articles and newspapers.
Jess Phillips was born in Birmingham to working class parents, her mother worked at the NHS and her father a school teacher, both parents, especially her dad, were highly socialist, Phillips said in 2016 that her dad still had not rejoined the Labour Party as a member due to it not being left-wing enough. Phillips herself was given Labour membership by her parents for her 14th birthday and she spent many of her evenings leafleting for the party as that is what her parents expected, rather than out of choice. She ended her Labour membership for a time under Blair’s leadership and has said she also protested the Iraq War.
Although her parents disapproved of it, Phillips went to a local grammar school. She also studied economic and social history and social policy at the University of Leeds from 2000-2003. Before she became MP she also studied for a postgraduate diploma in public sector management at the University of Birmingham from 2011 to 2013.
She has since dropped out of the election saying that at this time she did not believe she was the one to unite Labour and she has since backed Lisa Nandy for the Labour Leadership Election. She believes that it is important for a woman to become leader of the Labour Party and said that men need to pass the mic and let woman take top jobs.
Lack of support for the 2nd requirement to be eligible for the Leadership ballot and a bad performance at the first public hustings have been seen as reasons for her pulling out of the leadership race. But with her dropping out, Lisa Nandy has now become a more formidable opponent and could turn the two-way race between Keir Starmer and Rebecca Long-Bailey into a three-way race.
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