Stella Creasy

Stella Judith Creasy (born 5 April 1977) is a British Labour and Co-operative politician who has been Member of Parliament (MP) for the London constituency of Walthamstow since 2010.

Stella Creasy MP
Creasy in 2020
Shadow Minister for Business, Innovation and Skills
In office 8 October 2013 – 18 September 2015
Leader	Ed Miliband Harriet Harman (Acting)
Preceded by	Shabana Mahmood
Succeeded by	Chi Onwurah
Shadow Minister for Crime Prevention
In office 7 October 2011 – 8 October 2013
Leader	Ed Miliband
Preceded by	Office established
Succeeded by	Jack Dromey
Member of Parliament for Walthamstow
Incumbent
Assumed office 6 May 2010
Preceded by	Neil Gerrard
Majority	30,862 (63.8%)
Mayor of Waltham Forest
In office May 2002 – May 2003
Preceded by	Muhammed Fazlur Rahman
Succeeded by	Robert Belam
Personal details
Born	Stella Judith Creasy 5 April 1977 Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands, England
Political party	Labour and Co-operative
Education	Colchester County High School
Alma mater	Magdalene College, Cambridge London School of Economics
Profession	Politician, psychologist
Website	workingforwalthamstow.org.uk

She served in the frontbench teams of Ed Miliband and Harriet Harman from 2011 to 2015. Following the Labour Party's defeat at the 2015 general election, Creasy stood in the Labour Party deputy leadership election, finishing second to Tom Watson. She was a vocal critic of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and supported Owen Smith in the failed attempt to replace him in the 2016 leadership election.

Early life and career

Creasy was born on 5 April 1977 in Sutton Coldfield,[n 1][2] and is the daughter of Corinna Frances Avril (née Martin) and Philip Charles Creasy, both active Labour Party members; her father is a trained opera singer and her mother a headteacher of a special needs school.[2][3] Her elder brother, Matthew Henry Creasy (born 1974), is an academic.[4] Creasy is distantly related to members of the Peerage, as John Prendergast-Smyth, 1st Viscount Gort is her fourth great-grandparent. Creasy's mother described her own parents as "very aristocratic" and herself as "enormously privileged", which contributed to her decision to join the Labour Party.[2]

After spending her early childhood in the Manchester suburb of Didsbury, her family moved to Colchester where Creasy attended Colchester County High School for Girls, a grammar school.[2][3][5] Although she initially failed the eleven-plus exam, the Creasy family's move south gave her a second chance.[3] Creasy attended Magdalene College, Cambridge where she read Social and Political Sciences before pursuing postgraduate studies at the London School of Economics.[6] In the 1990s, towards the end of John Major's period as prime minister, Creasy was an intern at the Fabian Society.[7]

Creasy was deputy director of the Involve think tank and worked as a researcher and speech writer for various Labour government ministers, including Douglas Alexander, Charles Clarke and Ross Cranston.[8][9] She then became head of public affairs at the Scout Association.[10] In 2006, having already started work as a parliamentary researcher, she completed her thesis entitled Understanding the lifeworld of social exclusion,[11] receiving a doctorate in Social Psychology from the London School of Economics.[6] Creasy received a Titmuss Prize in 2005 for her thesis.[12]

Political career

Elected as a councillor in Waltham Forest, Creasy served as the borough's deputy mayor and later mayor from 2002 until 2003 and for four months in 2010 prior to her election to the House of Commons.[8][13][14] After the retirement of Labour MP, Neil Gerrard, Creasy was selected from an all-female shortlist as the party's candidate for Walthamstow, and was elected to Parliament at the 2010 general election.[15][16] She supported David Miliband's bid for the Labour Party leadership in 2010.[17]

Creasy joined Labour's frontbench team in October 2011 as Shadow Minister for Crime Prevention.[18] She then served as Shadow Minister for Business, Innovation and Skills from October 2013 to September 2015.[19][20][21] In 2014, she was described in an The Independent profile as "one of the brightest lights of Labour's new generation" though also as "haranguing" and "aggressive".[17] She supported the No More Page 3 campaign to stop The Sun newspaper from publishing pictures of topless glamour models.[22]

Creasy was re-elected at the 2015 general election with a substantially increased majority, securing a 17% increase in the share of the vote. Following the Labour Party's defeat in the election, she stood in the Labour Party deputy leadership election.[23][24] She stated she was prepared to work with any of the candidates for the party leadership, including Jeremy Corbyn, saying, "that process of rebuilding isn’t about any one person it's about all of us. It's written on the back of our membership card that we achieve more together than we do alone."[25][26] She gained 26% of the vote and finished second to Tom Watson. She did not back any of the final four leadership candidates.[27] She later became a vocal critic of Corbyn and said the party under his leadership was "running on empty".[28] She supported Owen Smith in the failed attempt to replace Corbyn in the 2016 Labour Party leadership election.[29] Also in 2016, she criticised Corbyn after he endorsed decriminalisation of the sex industry and accused left-wing campaign group Momentum of being more interested in "meetings and moralising" than real campaigning.[30][31]

At the 2017 general election, her majority increased again, with a 12% increase in the share of the vote. She argued in September 2018 that misogyny should be made a hate crime.[32] In June 2019, she described the culture of the Labour movement as toxic.[33] Later that year, she was protected from a potential trigger ballot and deselection by her local party as she was on maternity leave.[34]

Payday loans

Creasy campaigned successfully for better regulation of payday loans companies.[35] In an article published by The Guardian, she stated that just six companies controlled lending to 90% of the seven million Britons without a bank account or credit card. Her disclosure that the average cost of credit charged to these customers was 272% APR, as in the rest of Europe, and that there was a fourfold increase in payday loans since the start of the recession in 2008 led to cross-party parliamentary support for a cap.[35] Creasy also highlighted in a speech to the House of Commons the lack of competition in the market, leading to Government support for a cap of loans which exploit the poor, which in some cases reached 4000% APR.[36] Creasy won The Spectator magazine's Campaigner of the Year prize in their Parliamentarian of the Year awards in 2011 for her work on the issue,[37] and was also acknowledged by the coalition government's Chancellor George Osborne for having contributed to the government's change of policy.[38]

In 2012, a Wonga employee used company equipment to make offensive personal attacks against Creasy.[39] Wonga made an "immediate and unreserved apology" following these malicious attacks, and Creasy also managed to get the firm to promote one of her constituency events in aid of struggling families.[39]

Abortion rights

Abortion law in Northern Ireland is more restrictive than elsewhere in the United Kingdom, resulting in many women travelling from Northern Ireland to Great Britain to access abortion services. In 2017, a potential amendment to the Queen's Speech, organised by Creasy, calling for the Government to allocate adequate funding for women who are forced to travel to England to have an abortion, gained cross-party support and was ultimately signed by 100 MPs, threatening a government defeat.[40] Conservative MP Peter Bottomley was a co-signer of Creasy's amendment. In answer to a question from Bottomley in the Commons on 29 June 2017, Philip Hammond, Chancellor of the Exchequer, said the government would support free abortions on the mainland for Northern Irish women.[41][42] Earlier in June, a Supreme Court ruling upheld the legal basis for a charge of £900 for women from the province seeking an abortion on the mainland, whereas other necessary treatments on the NHS would have been free.[41][43] Creasy was cautious in her response to the development. "The devil will be in the detail", she said.[42] She was reported to have received threats from some anti-abortion activists.[44][45]

Twitter threats

At the end of July 2013, Creasy received numerous rape threats and other misogynistic messages on her Twitter timeline[46] after expressing support for the feminist campaigner Caroline Criado Perez, who had lobbied the Bank of England to put a woman on the £10 note and received similar messages.[3] On 2 September 2014 at the City of London Magistrates' Court, Peter Nunn was found guilty of sending menacing messages to Creasy,[47] and was subsequently jailed for eighteen weeks.[48]

Creasy wrote in an article published on 27 July: "Twitter tell me we should simply block those who 'offend us', as though a rape threat is matter of bad manners, not criminal behaviour."[49] She appeared on Newsnight on 30 July 2013 with Toby Young, the Conservative commentator, over the validity of addressing harassment on the social networking site.[50][51] She criticised him for a previous tweet about an MP's breasts.[52] Young has objected to Twitter's subsequent change in policy, writing that the company, "shouldn't change its abuse policy in response to being brow-beaten by a politician".[53]

Anti-war protests

Creasy allegedly received threats via social media following her vote for extending UK military action against ISIS to Syria after the parliamentary debate on 2 December 2015.[54] Creasy was undecided until the day of the vote, while staff in her Walthamstow constituency office had to deal with what they referred to as harassing telephone calls.[55] Protesters had gathered outside the closed constituency office the previous night urging a 'no' vote.[54][55] On Facebook, Creasy defended their right to peaceful protest.[56] Reports that protesters had gathered outside her home proved to be unfounded.[57][58]

Personal life

Creasy's partner is Dan Fox, a former director of Labour Friends of Israel.[59] In June 2019, she announced she was pregnant.[60] She gave birth to a daughter in November 2019 and, after campaigning for better maternity rights for MPs, became the first MP to appoint a 'locum MP', Kizzy Gardiner, to manage constituency work.[61][62][63] She regularly writes for Progress.[64]

Notes

1. Some sources suggest Creasy was born on 1 January 1977. Her father, in a letter to The Guardian, confirmed that 5 April is the correct date.[1]

References

1. "Brief Letters: Plaque Russians". The Guardian. 8 January 2013.
2. Coleman, John (5 July 2015). "Relative Values: Stella Creasy and her mum, Corinna". The Sunday Times. London. Retrieved 8 June 2019. CORINNA My parents came from a very aristocratic background, so it never occurred to them to be anything other than Tory. I grew up in Bushey in Hertfordshire and I went to a public school called St Margaret’s. At college, I realised how enormously privileged I was, so partly out of a sense of guilt, I joined the Labour party.
3. Addley, Esther (1 August 2013). "Stella Creasy: the MP who 'won't back down'". The Guardian.
4. "University of Glasgow - Schools - School of Critical Studies - Our staff - Dr Matthew Creasy". www.gla.ac.uk.
5. Fitzgerald, Todd (1 September 2015). "Labour deputy hopeful Stella Creasy issues devolution warning to Greater Manchester's leaders". Manchester Evening News. Manchester Evening News. Retrieved 17 June 2020.
6. Day, Elizabeth (25 November 2012). "Stella Creasy: Labour's rising star who's taking on Wonga". The Guardian. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
7. Bland, Archie (13 June 2014). "Stella Creasy: Could the Wonga-baiting, indie-loving MP tweet her way to No 10?". The Independent. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
8. "Members Of Parliament in Walthamstow".
9. "Stella Creasy – Biography".
10. David Singleton (11 May 2010). "Many lobbyists win seats but some see majority decreased". PR Week. Archived from the original on 21 March 2011.
11. Creasy, Stella Judith (2006). Understanding the lifeworld of social exclusion. lse.ac.uk (PhD thesis). London School of Economics. doi:10.21953/lse.vwxamjarbb08. OCLC 500283354. EThOS uk.bl.ethos.429036.
12. "20 under 40: Stella Creasy". New Statesman. 22 September 2011. Retrieved 2 February 2016.
13. "The Mayor". Waltham Forest Council. Retrieved 17 June 2019.
14. "Walthamstow Memories - Walthamstow Mayors". www.walthamstowmemories.net.
15. Owen, Paul (3 August 2009). "The 32-year-old ex-mayor who hopes to bring activists and party together". The Guardian.
16. Election 2010– Walthamstow BBC News
17. "Stella Creasy: Could the Wonga-baiting, indie-loving MP tweet her way". The Independent. 14 June 2014. Retrieved 28 May 2018.
18. Boffey, Daniel (11 August 2013). "Ed Miliband plans fourth reshuffle to shake up shadow cabinet". The Guardian.
19. "Confirmed: Labour's new frontbench team in full | LabourList". LabourList | Labour's biggest independent grassroots e-network. 8 October 2013. Retrieved 28 May 2018.
20. "Diane Abbott axed as shadow health minister by Ed Miliband". BBC. 8 October 2013.
21. "Jeremy Corbyn's full frontbench team unveiled". BBC. 18 September 2015.
22. Orr, Deborah; Creasy, Stella; Bindel, Julie; Short, Clare; Bates, Laura; Bidisha; Toynbee, Polly; Khaleeli, Homa; Whitehorn, Katharine; Sladden, Katherine (20 January 2015). "Is the Sun's scrapping of Page 3 topless models a victory for women?" – via The Guardian.
23. Bush, Stephen (16 May 2015). "Stella Creasy announces she will stand for the deputy leadership of the Labour party". New Statesman. Retrieved 30 July 2015.
24. Dathan, Matt (17 June 2015). "Stella Creasy scrapes through as five make it onto the ballot for deputy Labour leadership election". The Independent. Retrieved 30 July 2015.
25. Lewis, Helen (11 August 2015). "Stella Creasy rages against the political machine, but can she break it?". New Statesman. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
26. Midgley, Carol (22 August 2015). "'It's not a question of left or right — Labour's challenge is to be relevant'". The Times. London. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
27. Addley, Esther (1 November 2015). "Stella Creasy: 'New politics? I'm still waiting for that to happen'". The Guardian. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
28. Creasy, Stella (1 July 2016). "Labour is a party running on empty". New Statesman. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
29. "Full list of MPs and MEPs backing challenger Owen Smith". LabourList. 21 July 2016. Retrieved 15 July 2019.
30. Watts, Joseph (8 March 2016). "Stella attacks Jeremy Corbyn for his call to decriminalise sex industry". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
31. Mason, Rowena (24 March 2016). "Labour MP Stella Creasy attacks Momentum movement". The Guardian. Retrieved 23 July 2016.
32. "Make misogyny a hate crime, Stella Creasy urges". BBC News. 4 September 2018.
33. "Stella Creasy: The culture of the Labour movement is toxic". Sky News. 19 June 2019. Retrieved 20 June 2019.
34. Rodgers, Sienna (12 September 2019). "Rolling list: Trigger ballots for Labour MPs". Labour List. Retrieved 17 October 2019.
35. Creasy, Stella (3 February 2011). "Legal loan sharks are circling the poor". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 September 2012.
36. "MP urges government crack-down on legal loan sharks". BBC News. 3 February 2011. Retrieved 25 September 2012.
37. Forsyth, James (26 November 2011). "Labour's new golden girl". The Spectator. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
38. Murphy, Joe (25 November 2013). "Osborne rushes in law to cap payday loan rates". London Evening Standard. p. 2.
39. Mark King (21 November 2012). "Wonga apologises to Stella Creasy over abusive Twitter messages". Guardian newspapers. Retrieved 21 November 2012.
40. Merrick, Rob (29 June 2017). "Theresa May scrambles to avoid a defeat on abortion charges for Northern Irish women forced to travel to Britain". The Independent. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
41. Elgot, Jessica; McDonald, Henry (29 June 2017). "Government to give Northern Irish women access to free abortions". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
42. Hughes, Laura (29 June 2017). "Philip Hammond announces NI women will be given free abortions in England". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
43. Creasy, Stella (23 June 2017). "Northern Irish women deserve equality. That's why I'm challenging abortion law". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
44. "Stella Creasy 'received Jo Cox-style death threat from anti-abortion activist'". Evening Standard. Retrieved 11 June 2018.
45. "Anti-abortion activist tells Labour MP 'hopefully she will die like Jo Cox'". The Independent. Retrieved 11 June 2018.
46. Emily Dugan "Pressure grows on Twitter to act on rape threats after Labour MP Stella Creasy calls in police", The Independent, 29 July 2013
47. "Twitter 'troll sent rape threats to MP Stella Creasy'". BBC News. 19 May 2014.
48. "Man jailed for Twitter abuse of MP". BBC News. 29 September 2014. Retrieved 29 September 2014.
49. Stella Creasy "Twitter's inadequate action over rape threats is itself an abuse", The Guardian, 27 July 2013
50. "Stella Creasy Shames Toby Young For Breasts Tweet In Newsnight Twitter Debate", The Huffington Post, 31 July 2013. See Esler's tweet confirming it was on the 30 July edition.
51. "Newsnight debate: What should be done about Twitter trolls?", BBC News, 31 July 2013
52. "'Stop Tweeting About Women's Tits'". The Huffington Post UK. Retrieved 17 March 2016.
53. Toby Young "Twitter abuse: Stella Creasy has overstepped the mark", telegraph.co.uk (blog), 31 July 2013
54. Butter, Susannah (3 December 2015). "The battle for Stella Creasy's streets: how the bombing of Syria is causing a growing divide in Walthamstow". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 4 December 2015.
55. Marshall, Tom (5 December 2015). "Stella Creasy defends anti-war protesters who marched on her Walthamstow office". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 6 December 2015.
56. McSmith, Andy (3 December 2015). "Why Stella Creasy has become prime target for deselection over Syria vote". The Independent. Retrieved 6 December 2015.
57. Greenslade, Roy (4 December 2015). "Stella Creasy crushes story about protest outside her house". The Guardian. Retrieved 4 December 2015.
58. "Today, Radio 4, 3 December 2015: Finding by the Editorial Complaints Unit". Editorial Complaints Unit. BBC. Retrieved 13 September 2016.
59. Milan, Aidan (18 June 2019). "What has Stella Creasy said about her partner as the pregnant MP highlights Parliament maternity rights?". The Metro. Retrieved 20 June 2019.
60. Creasy, Stella (17 June 2019). "I'm pregnant and forced to choose between being an MP and a mum". The Guardian.
61. "'Locum MP' to cover Stella Creasy maternity". BBC News. 3 October 2019. Retrieved 15 February 2020.
62. Geall, Lauren (28 November 2019). "Stella Creasy announces her birth with a clever Labour pun". Stylist. Retrieved 15 February 2020.
63. Fishwick, Samuel (5 November 2019). "Stella Creasy on being the first MP to have maternity cover and why misogyny is still a blind spot". Evening Standard. Retrieved 13 July 2020.
64. "Stella Creasy MP – Progress | Centre-right Labour politics". www.progressonline.org.uk. Retrieved 28 May 2018.

External links

• Profile at Parliament of the United Kingdom
• Contributions in Parliament at Hansard
• Voting record at Public Whip
• Record in Parliament at TheyWorkForYou
• Interview by John Rentoul of Ethos Journal