David Miliband

David Miliband
Official portrait, c. 2007–10
President of the International Rescue Committee
Assumed office
1 September 2013
Preceded byGeorge Erik Rupp
Foreign Secretary
In office
28 June 2007 – 11 May 2010
Prime MinisterGordon Brown
Preceded byMargaret Beckett
Succeeded byWilliam Hague
Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
In office
5 May 2006 – 27 June 2007
Prime MinisterTony Blair
Preceded byMargaret Beckett
Succeeded byHilary Benn
Minister of State for Communities and Local Government
In office
11 May 2005 – 5 May 2006
Prime MinisterTony Blair
Preceded byOffice established
Succeeded byRuth Kelly
Junior ministerial offices
Minister of State for the Cabinet Office
In office
16 December 2004 – 11 May 2005
Prime MinisterTony Blair
Preceded byDouglas Alexander (2003)
Succeeded byDavid Laws (2012)
Minister of State for Schools
In office
24 October 2002 – 16 December 2004
Prime MinisterTony Blair
Preceded byStephen Timms
Succeeded byStephen Twigg
Shadow Cabinet posts
Shadow Foreign Secretary
In office
11 May 2010 – 8 October 2010
LeaderHarriet Harman (acting)
Ed Miliband
Preceded byWilliam Hague
Succeeded byYvette Cooper
Further offices held
Director of the Number 10 Policy Unit
In office
2 May 1997 – 7 June 2001
Prime MinisterTony Blair
Preceded byNorman Blackwell
Succeeded byAndrew Adonis
Member of Parliament
for South Shields
In office
7 June 2001 – 15 April 2013
Preceded byDavid Clark
Succeeded byEmma Lewell-Buck
Personal details
Born
David Wright Miliband

(1965-07-15) 15 July 1965 (age 59)
London, England
Political partyLabour
Spouse
Louise Shackelton
(m. 1998)
Children2 sons
Parents
RelativesEd Miliband (brother)
Residence(s)Upper West Side, Manhattan, New York, U.S.
EducationBradford Grammar School
Haverstock School
Alma mater
AwardsKennedy Scholarship (1988)
Signature

David Wright Miliband (born 15 July 1965) is the president and chief executive officer (CEO) of the International Rescue Committee and a former British Labour Party politician.[1] He was the Foreign Secretary from 2007 to 2010[2] and the Member of Parliament (MP) for South Shields in North East England from 2001 to 2013. He and his brother, Ed, were the first siblings to sit in the Cabinet simultaneously since Lord Edward and Oliver Stanley in 1938. He was a candidate for Labour Party leadership in 2010, following the departure of Gordon Brown, but was defeated by his brother and subsequently left politics.

Miliband started his career at the Institute for Public Policy Research. Aged 29, he became Tony Blair's Head of Policy while the Labour Party was in opposition, and he was a contributor to Labour's manifesto for the 1997 election, which brought the party to power. Blair subsequently made him head of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit from 1997 to 2001, at which point Miliband was elected to Parliament for the seat of South Shields.

Miliband spent the next few years in various junior ministerial posts, including at the Department for Education and Skills, before joining the Cabinet in 2006 as Environment Secretary. His tenure in this post saw climate change consolidated as a priority for policymakers and on the succession of Gordon Brown as Prime Minister in 2007, Miliband was promoted to become Foreign Secretary.[3] At the age of 41, he became the youngest person to hold that office since David Owen 30 years earlier. In September 2010, Miliband narrowly lost the Labour leadership election to his brother Ed. On 29 September 2010, he announced that to avoid "constant comparison" with his brother, and because of the "perpetual, distracting and destructive attempts to find division where there is none, and splits where they don't exist, all to the detriment of the party's cause", he would not stand for the Shadow Cabinet.[4]

On 15 April 2013, Miliband resigned from Parliament in order to take up the posts of President and CEO of the International Rescue Committee in New York City, which triggered a by-election in South Shields.[2][5][6]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference :1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ a b "David Miliband — Somerville College Oxford". University of Oxford. Archived from the original on 23 September 2020. Retrieved 24 May 2016.
  3. ^ "David Miliband – President & CEO of the International Rescue Committee (IRC)". rescue.org. Retrieved 24 May 2016.
  4. ^ Mulholland, Hélène (29 September 2010). "David Miliband quits frontline politics". The Guardian. London. Archived from the original on 30 June 2009. Retrieved 29 September 2010.
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference BBC21947497 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ "May 2 the likely date for South Shields by-election". Shields Gazette. 28 March 2013. Archived from the original on 30 June 2009. Retrieved 29 September 2013.