Jon Cruddas is the Labour Member of Parliament for the constituency of Dagenham and Rainham, where he was first elected in May 2001. Jon was born in Helston, Cornwall and was educated at Oaklands Roman Catholic Comprehensive School, Waterlooville, Portsmouth. He graduated from the University of Warwick where he received an M.A and Ph.D in Industrial and Business Studies.
Jon started his career as a policy officer for the Labour Party in 1989. After the 1997 general election, he was employed as Deputy Political Secretary to newly elected Prime Minister Tony Blair. His role included becoming a liaison between the Prime Minister and trade unions, he also worked heavily on the introduction of the minimum wage. He was first elected as the MP for Dagenham in the 2001 general election, and in 2010 the constituency boundary changed to Dagenham and Rainham. In 2006, Jon contested to become Deputy Leader of the Labour Party. In May 2012, Jon became Labour’s Policy Coordinator under Ed Miliband.
In Parliament, Jon currently sits at the chairperson for the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Allergy and has been instrumental in securing greater awareness of allergy in parliament. In October 2021, the APPG along with stakeholders including Allergy UK published the report ‘Meeting the challenges of the National Allergy Crisis’.