John Prescott

The Right Honourable
The Lord Prescott
The Right Honourable The Lord Prescott
	Official portrait, c. 1997
Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
	In office; 2 May 1997 – 27 June 2007
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	Michael Heseltine
Succeeded by	Nick Clegg
Deputy Leader of the Labour Party
	In office; 21 July 1994 – 24 June 2007
Leader	Tony Blair
Preceded by	Margaret Beckett
Succeeded by	Harriet Harman
First Secretary of State
	In office; 8 June 2001 – 27 June 2007
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	Michael Heseltine
Succeeded by	The Lord Mandelson
Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions
	In office; 2 May 1997 – 8 June 2001
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	John Gummer (Environment); George Young (Transport);
Succeeded by	Margaret Beckett (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs); Stephen Byers (Transport, Local Government and the Regions);
Member of the House of Lords
	Lord Temporal
	In office; 8 July 2010 – 9 July 2024; Life peerage
Member of Parliament; for Kingston upon Hull East
	In office; 18 June 1970 – 12 April 2010
Preceded by	Harry Pursey
Succeeded by	Karl Turner
Leader
Shadow cabinet posts
Shadow Secretary of State for Employment
	In office; 21 October 1993 – 21 July 1994
Leader	John Smith; Margaret Beckett (interim);
Preceded by	Frank Dobson
Succeeded by	Harriet Harman
	In office; 26 October 1984 – 13 July 1987
Leader	Neil Kinnock
Preceded by	John Smith
Succeeded by	Michael Meacher
Shadow Secretary of State for Transport
	In office; 23 November 1988 – 21 October 1993
Leader	Neil Kinnock; John Smith;
Preceded by	Robert Hughes
Succeeded by	Frank Dobson
	In office; 31 October 1983 – 26 October 1984
Leader	Neil Kinnock
Preceded by	Albert Booth
Succeeded by	Gwyneth Dunwoody
Shadow Secretary of State for Energy
	In office; 13 July 1987 – 23 November 1988
Leader	Neil Kinnock
Preceded by	Stan Orme
Succeeded by	Tony Blair
Personal details
Born	John Leslie Prescott; 31 May 1938 (age 86); Prestatyn, Wales
Political party	Labour
Spouse	Pauline Tilston (m. 1961)
Children	2
Education	Ruskin College
Alma mater	University of Hull
Signature
	John Prescott's voice Prescott briefs the European Parliament on the results of the Kyoto Conference on Climate Change; Recorded 17 February 1998

John Leslie Prescott, Baron Prescott (born 31 May 1938), is a British politician who served as Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007 and as First Secretary of State from 2001 to 2007. A member of the Labour Party, he was Member of Parliament (MP) for Kingston upon Hull East for 40 years, from 1970 to 2010. He was often seen as the political link to the working class in a Labour Party increasingly led by modernising, middle-class professionals such as Tony Blair and Peter Mandelson, and developed a reputation as a key conciliator in the often fractious relationship between Blair and Gordon Brown.

Born in Prestatyn, Wales, in his youth Prescott failed the eleven-plus entrance exam for grammar school and worked as a ship's steward and trade union activist. He went on to graduate from Ruskin College and the University of Hull. In the 1994 Labour Party leadership election, he stood for both the leadership and deputy leadership, winning election to the latter office. He was appointed deputy prime minister after Labour's victory in the 1997 election, with an expanded brief as Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions until 2001, then subsequently as First Secretary of State until 2007. In June 2007, he resigned as deputy prime minister, coinciding with Blair's resignation as prime minister. Following an election within the Labour Party, he was replaced as deputy leader by Harriet Harman.

After retiring as a member of Parliament at the 2010 general election, Prescott was made a life peer and sat in the House of Lords until 2024. He stood unsuccessfully as the Labour candidate in the 2012 election to be the first police and crime commissioner for Humberside Police. Prescott resigned from the Privy Council in 2013 to protest delays to the introduction of press regulation, of which he had become a proponent. In February 2015, he briefly returned to politics as an adviser to Labour leader Ed Miliband.

Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).

[a]

[b]

[c]