Emily Thornberry

Emily Thornberry      (Lawyer, Politician)
Born	Emily Anne Thornberry 27 July 1960 Surrey, England
Alma mater	Kent University
Children	1 daughter 2 sons
Spouse	Christopher Nugee
Member of	Labour Friends of Israel
Party	Labour
Shadow Foreign Secretary  In office 27 June 2016 - Present Preceded by Hilary Benn  Shadow Secretary of State for Defence  In office 5 January 2016 - 27 June 2016 Preceded by Maria Eagle Succeeded by Clive Lewis  Shadow Minister of State for Employment In office 16 September 2015 - 6 January 2016  Shadow Attorney General  In office 7 October 2011 - 3 December 2014 Preceded by Patricia Scotland Succeeded by Willy Bach  Member of Parliament for Islington South and Finsbury In office 5 May 2005 - Present  Shadow Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union  In office 20 July 2016 - 6 October 2016 Succeeded by Keir Starmer  Shadow First Secretary of State In office 14 June 2017 - Present

Emily Thornberry (born 27 July 1960) is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Islington South and Finsbury since the 2005 General Election and is currently Shadow Foreign Secretary in Jeremy Corbyn's team.

Background

Emily Thornberry was born in Surrey, the daughter of Sallie and Cedric Thornberry. She studied law at the University of Kent before practising as a barrister from 1985 to 2005, specialising in human rights law under the guidance of Michael Mansfield.

Parliament

Emily Thornberry was first elected to Parliament in 2005, serving on the Communities and Local Government Select Committee from 2005 to 2010. In the 2005–2010 Parliament, she spoke out on both housing issues and issues relating to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, as well as voting against the whip on issues relating to national security on several occasions.

Thornberry was re-elected in the 2010 General Election, and appointed Shadow Attorney General in Ed Miliband's team, serving until she resigned on 20 November 2014 after sending a tweet that some perceived as snobbish. She was again re-elected in the 2015 General Election. After Jeremy Corbyn won the 2015 Labour leadership election on 12 September, Thornberry was appointed Shadow Minister of State for Employment. In a shadow cabinet reshuffle in January 2016, she became Shadow Defence Secretary, replacing Maria Eagle.

In June 2016, Emily Thornberry was appointed Shadow Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs in another reshuffle.

Foreign Affairs

Israel

On 30 June 2016, when Shami Chakrabarti's report into alleged antisemitism in the Labour party was published and Jeremy Corbyn's comments at the press conference were misconstrued by the commercially-controlled media, Emily Thornberry phoned the Israeli Ambassador Mark Regev to apologise. Corbyn had said:

"Our Jewish friends are no more responsible for the actions of Israel or the Netanyahu government than our Muslim friends are for those various self-styled Islamic states or organisations."

When later asked if he was comparing Israel to Islamic State, Corbyn said:

"No, no of course I'm not. The point in the report is that you shouldn't say to somebody just because they're Jewish, you must have an opinion on Israel. Any more than you say to anyone who is a Muslim you must have an opinion on any vile action that's been taken by misquoting the good name of Islam. I just ask people to be respectful and inclusive in their debate."

A source close to Emily Thornberry said Ambassador Regev "had no issue with the speech."

Syria

On 11 October 2016, in a House of Commons emergency debate on the situation in Syria, Emily Thornberry accused Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson of hypocrisy and of preferring “brinkmanship” to “statesmanship”. She told her fellow MPs that it was inadmissible that the government expressed concern over the Syrian civilians trapped in the five-year war, while it continued selling arms to allies in the region:

“If we say those things about Russia and Aleppo we must be prepared for what they say about Saudi Arabia and Yemen. We cannot condemn one and continue selling arms to the other, we cannot call for investigations into one and say to the other that we are happy for them to investigate themselves. We cannot pour scorn on the assurances of one that they have not hit civilian targets while blithely accepting the assurances of the other. Most of all, Mr Speaker, we cannot cry for the people of Aleppo and the suffering they face while turning a blind eye to the million children in Yemen facing starvation.”

The Shadow Foreign Secretary also challenged the government on its eagerness to intervene in the war in Syria, standing firmly against an unenforceable no-fly zone and arguing for “more statesmanship and less brinkmanship.”

Iran

In January 2018, following violent demonstrations in Iran, Downing Street warned Iranian leaders that “Britain was watching” and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson urged them to “debate the legitimate and important issues” raised by protesters. The Huffington Post reported that Emily Thornberry claimed Labour is unable to back demonstrators protesting against the Iranian government because it is unclear who has the White Hats:

“Our approach now is one of extreme caution when it comes to Iran, and a recognition that the society in Iran is a immensely complex one, and seemingly contradictory.

“For example, with these current riots, sometimes they are...calling to reinstate the monarchy, sometimes they’re calling out against Khamenei, sometimes they’re calling for Khamenei, sometimes they’re calling for the price of eggs.

“It’s very difficult, in those circumstances to actually come to a conclusion as to what political forces are behind the current disputes on the streets of Iran, so we take a cautious approach.”

"We don’t want to leap to judgement and say, well we don’t like the regime in Iran, these people are against it, they must be the guys with White Hats, because it doesn’t work like that.

“We’ve seen that in Syria, we’ve seen it in Libya, we see it time and time again in Egypt...we cannot simply impose our views on people who are fighting against, you know, Mubarak, who we don’t like.”

PMQs

Standing in for Jeremy Corbyn at PMQs on 31 January 2018 (David Lidington deputising for Theresa May on a visit to China), Emily Thornberry called for 16-year-olds to be given the vote. Reminding the House of Commons that it was the centenary of women’s suffrage and that the vote had at first been extended to women over the age of 30 who owned property, and then 50 years ago given to all 18-year-olds – so how many years would we have to wait until 16-year-olds could vote?

Thornberry pointed out that Britain had led the way in reducing the voting age from 21 to 18, so why not do so again? At 16 people are free from parental control, can leave home, start a family, join the forces and start work, she said.

“There is no logical principled objection to votes at 16, which is why every party in this house supports it except the Tories and the DUP.”

Their opposition to change made them not a coalition of chaos – May’s warning against voting Labour at the General Election, frequently thrown back at the Tories after their deal with the DUP – “they’re a coalition of cavemen”.

After an objection to the “unparliamentary language” was shot down by the Speaker, Thornberry concluded, asking:

“Why doesn’t the minister realise the lessons that we women taught our predecessors? When change is right it cannot be resisted for ever and this is change whose time has come.”

Many thanks to our Patrons who cover ~2/3 of our hosting bill. Please join them if you can.