Jon Cruddas

Jon Cruddas retired from parliament in 2024. In 2001 he was elected as the Labour MP for Dagenham in East London, re-designated Dagenham and Rainham following boundary changes in 2010. He stood to be Deputy Leader of the Labour Party in 2007 and between 2012 and 2015 served in the Shadow Cabinet as Policy Coordinator for the party.

He received an BSc, MA and PhD from Warwick University. He was a Visiting Fellow at the University of Wisconsin, Madison between 1987 and 1988. In 1989 he joined the Labour Party Research Department with responsibility for labour market policy. In 1994 he was transferred to run the office of the General Secretary. Following the 1997 election he moved to Downing Street having been appointed Deputy Political Secretary to the Prime Minister Tony Blair, working on labour market policy and relations with the unions and TUC. In that period, Labour introduced the National Minimum Wage and a series of initiatives to support union recognition and fairness at work.

He is currently a Senior Fellow at the McDonald Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Life at the University of Oxford. Cruddas is also an Honorary Fellow of Nuffield College Oxford and Honorary Professor at the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at the University of Birmingham. In his writings and throughout his time as an MP, Jon has championed the importance of civic mindedness, flourishing communities and a strong social fabric. He has maintained a longstanding interest in virtue ethics and the common good, with a particular focus on how work provides citizens with meaning, purpose and belonging. His 2021 book The Dignity of Labour explored the economics and future of work. His 2024 book A Century of Labour revisited the history of the party to commemorate the centenary of the first Labour government. He is currently writing a history of the relationship between the Labour Party and Catholicism.

He is currently helping oversee a project on The Future of the Left at the think tank Policy Exchange and alongside the former Chancellor Rt. Hon. Sir Sajid Javid is Co-Chairing the Independent Commission on Community and Cohesion across the UK.

Jon Cruddas is married with one son.