Jess Phillips

Jessica Rose Phillips (Trainor; born 9 October 1981) is a British politician serving as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Birmingham Yardley since 2015.

Jessica Phillips was born on 9 October 1981 in Birmingham.

The youngest of four children, Phillips is the daughter of Stewart Trainor, a teacher, and Jean Trainor (née Mackay), an NHS administrator who rose to become deputy chief executive of the NHS Confederation and chair of South Birmingham Mental Health Trust.

Phillips studied economic and social history and social policy at the University of Leeds from 2000 to 2003.

She has said she marched in protest against the Iraq War.

From 2010 onwards, Phillips worked for the Women's Aid Federation of England as a business development manager, responsible for managing refuges for victims of domestic abuse in Sandwell in the West Midlands.

Phillips left the Labour Party during the years of Tony Blair's leadership, rejoining after the 2010 general election.

Her period at Women's Aid as an administrator made Phillips "utterly pragmatic... I learned that my principles don't matter as much as people's lives."

From 2011 to 2013, she studied for a postgraduate diploma in public sector management at the University of Birmingham.

Phillips worked for a period for her parents at their company, Healthlinks Event Management Services.

In the 2012 local elections, she was elected as a Labour councillor for the Longbridge ward, taking the seat from the Conservatives.

She was then appointed as the victims' champion at Birmingham City Council, lobbying police and criminal justice organisations on behalf of victims.

She also served on the West Midlands Police and Crime Panel.

Phillips was selected from an all-women shortlist to contest Birmingham Yardley in June 2013, which was then represented by John Hemming of the Liberal Democrats.

Phillips was appointed as Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Lucy Powell, the Shadow Education Secretary, in 2015.

A vocal critic of the former Leader of the Labour Party Jeremy Corbyn, Phillips resigned as a PPS in protest over Corbyn's leadership and said she would "find it incredibly difficult" to continue as an MP if Corbyn were re-elected as Labour leader.

At the 2015 general election, Phillips was elected as Member of Parliament (MP) for Birmingham Yardley, winning with 41.5% of the vote and a majority of 6,595 votes.

Her maiden speech concerned homelessness and "improving [Britain]'s response to victims of domestic and sexual violence and abuse in all its forms."

In the 2015 Labour leadership election, Phillips nominated Yvette Cooper for Labour leader and Tom Watson for deputy leader.

Phillips was appointed as the Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Lucy Powell, the Shadow Secretary of State for Education, in September 2015.

She supported Owen Smith in the failed attempt to replace Corbyn in the 2016 leadership election.

They were politically active; in March 2016, she told Rachel Cooke of The Observer: "Growing up with my father was like growing up with Jeremy Corbyn."

Phillips went to King Edward VI Camp Hill School for Girls, a local grammar school.

Her childhood ambition was to become Prime Minister.

In June 2016, she resigned as PPS to Lucy Powell, following the resignation of Powell and other Shadow Cabinet members over the leadership of Corbyn.

In July 2016, Phillips threatened to resign from the Labour Party and sit as an independent MP if Corbyn was re-elected as leader of the party, stating she would find it "incredibly difficult" to continue serving under Corbyn's leadership.

She supported Owen Smith in the failed attempt to replace Corbyn in the 2016 Labour leadership election.

In September 2016, she was elected chair of the Women's Parliamentary Labour Party (WPLP), defeating her predecessor Dawn Butler, considered a Corbyn ally.

Phillips criticised the calling of the 2017 snap election.

She was reselected as the Labour candidate for Birmingham Yardley, while her predecessor as MP for the seat John Hemming was reselected by the Liberal Democrats, in what was reported as a "grudge match".

At the snap 2017 general election, Phillips was re-elected as MP for Birmingham Yardley with an increased vote share of 57.1% and an increased majority of 16,574 votes.

Upon her victory, she continued her criticisms of Hemming.

Following the general election, Phillips said the Women's PLP would co-ordinate to promote policies beneficial to women in the context of a hung parliament.

In July 2017, Phillips called for a review into elections for chairs of House of Commons select committees due to the relatively low number of female candidates.

In March 2018, Phillips again threatened to resign from the Labour Party, this time in response to Labour's handling of sexual harassment allegations against Labour MP Kelvin Hopkins, stating that she would "cut up her membership card" if the alleged victim was questioned by Hopkins as part of the investigation.

In July 2018 it was reported that Phillips served as deputy editor of The House, the in-house Parliamentary magazine published by the Dods Group, which had been purchased by Conservative Party donor and former vice-chairman Michael Ashcroft, earning an annual salary of £8,000 for two hours' work per month.

Since 2019, Phillips has received the second highest income on top of her MP's salary amongst Labour Party MPs.

In March 2019, she said: "I think I'd be a good prime minister" and that "I feel like I can't leave the Labour Party without rolling the dice one more time. I owe it that. But it doesn't own me. It's nothing more than a logo if it doesn't stand for something that I actually care about – it's just a f***ing rose."

A member of the Labour Party, she was Shadow Minister for Domestic Violence and Safeguarding in Keir Starmer's Opposition frontbench from 2020 to 2023.

Phillips was a candidate for Labour leader in the 2020 leadership election, but withdrew early in the contest.