Neil Coyle

He went to Wenlock and Ashcroft schools before being educated at the Bedford School, an independent school for boys founded in 1552.

He received a BA in British Politics and Legislative Studies from the University of Hull.

Neil Alan John Coyle (born 30 December 1978) is a British politician who has served as a Labour Party Member of Parliament (MP) for Bermondsey and Old Southwark since 2015.

Coyle has courted controversy throughout his time in parliament, after being found to be abusive to constituents, racist to journalists, and guilty of bullying Labour parliamentary staff.

He has blamed his conduct on alcoholism.

Coyle was suspended by Labour and banned from Parliament's bars for six months.

Despite complaints from local party members, he controversially had the whip reinstated in May 2023.

Since 2023 Coyle has pledged to be teetotal.

Coyle grew up in Luton and is one of six children.

From 2001 to 2003, he lived in China.

Coyle was elected as a councillor for Newington ward in the Southwark London Borough Council election 2010.

As a councillor, he supported the unsuccessful Garden Bridge project, on which his wife worked as a landscape architect.

He was deputy mayor of Southwark from 2014 to 2015.

Coyle defeated the Liberal Democrat incumbent, Simon Hughes, to take the seat of Bermondsey and Old Southwark at the 2015 general election.

He was one of 36 Labour MPs to nominate Jeremy Corbyn as a candidate in the Labour leadership election of 2015.

Following his election, he was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Shadow Leader of the House of Commons.

He stood down as a councillor in 2016.

Following the May 2016 elections, he co-wrote an article with Jo Cox which said that they had "come to regret" the decision of voting to make Jeremy Corbyn leader of the opposition.

After the article was published, Coyle resigned from the shadow cabinet.

He then supported Owen Smith in his unsuccessful attempt to replace Jeremy Corbyn in the 2016 leadership election.

Coyle was highly critical of Corbyn and wrote a series of articles arguing against his position on several key issues, such as terrorism and Brexit.

In the 2016 referendum on the UK leaving the European Union (EU), Coyle campaigned to remain.

In February 2017, Coyle was one of 47 Labour MPs who defied the party's three-line whip to vote against triggering Article 50 for the UK to leave the EU and has called for it to be revoked.

Coyle sits on the Work and Pensions Select Committee.

At the 2017 snap general election, Coyle increased his majority.

He chairs the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Wines and Spirits, the secretariat for which is provided by the Wine and Spirit Trade Association, which is based in Coyle's constituency.

He also chairs the APPG for Foodbanks, which he established in 2017, as well as those for Ending Homelessness and Counter Extremism.

He is a member of the Co-operative Party and Progressive Britain.

In February 2019, Coyle said that he had declined an invitation to join The Independent Group, later Change UK, a splinter group of centrist Labour and Conservative MPs that formed that month.

In May 2021, Coyle reported Corbyn to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, claiming that Corbyn had failed to declare full legal funding.

The Commissioner did not uphold the complaint, noting there was no requirement to register legal support from a membership organisation.

On 11 February 2022, as a result of controversial statements by Coyle, the Labour whip was suspended from him and he was barred from all bars on the Westminster estate (see Alleged racism below).

Coyle also had his Labour Party membership administratively suspended, pending an investigation.

In May 2023, he was readmitted to the Labour Party.

Coyle has been criticised for his use of language in public on a number of occasions.

In September 2019, Coyle referred to Prime Minister Boris Johnson on British television as "a dick".

Following the incident, Coyle spoke with the Southwark News, saying his constituents had complained about his use of language, suggesting he does not "need to be that crude".

Coyle told the Southwark News, "I will be toning down the language but never the passion".

Three weeks after the first incident, Coyle again used inappropriate language on his Twitter account.

During the 2019 Labour Party Conference, Jeremy Corbyn made a Brexit statement that the Labour Party would not be immediately backing either leave or remain.