Who is Alan Johnson? Labour MP, former Home Secretary and guest pannellist on Have I Got News For You
The former Labour MP quit after 20 years in Parliament after the snap election was called by Theresa May
ALAN Johnson was once tipped as a potential Labour leader, but he quit the political party in April.
Here’s what you need to know about the man who went from a Wandsworth council flat to Westminster.
Who is Alan Johnson? What’s his background?
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn once described Alan Johnson as “the epitome of Labour values”.
He was born in London on 17 May 1950 and was orphaned at the age of 12 when his mother died.
He was effectively brought up in a Wandsworth council flat by his then 16-year-old sister.
After leaving school at 15-years-old, Johnson then stacked shelves at Tesco before becoming a postman at 18.
Johnson then joined the Union of Communication Workers, a trade union for workers in the post office, for whom he became General Secretary in 1992.
The former MP then joined the Labour party in 1971.
What is Alan Johnson known for?
In the 1997 general election, Alan Johnson was selected by Labour to stand for parliament in the safe seat of Hull West and Hessle, a seat he held for 20 years until April 2017.
The former frontbench MP was appointed as the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions under a Tony Blair government in 2005.
Under Gordon Brown, Johnson became both the Health Secretary and Home secretary between 2007 and 2010.
Johnson also led Labour’s fight to remain in the EU before the referendum.
His first memoirs, This Boy: A Memoir of a Childhood was published in 2013 and won the Orwell Prize for Britain’s top political writing award.
While his second memoirs, Please, Mister Postman, was crowned autobiography of the year by the Specsavers National book Award .
Why did Alan Johnson quit the Labour party?
Alan Johnson announced that he would stand down as an MP in the wake of Theresa May’s shock decision to call a snap election.
In a letter Johnson wrote: “I’ve decided that going now will give me the opportunity to do other things with my life and is therefore in the best interests of me and my family. I also think it’s best for the Party.”
Johnson was known to be unhappy with the direction of the Labour party under Jeremy Corbyn.
