15 Facts About Jennie Formby

Jennifer "Jennie" Formby is a British trade unionist and political figure who served as General Secretary of the Labour Party from 2018 to 2020.

Jennie Formby was previously political director and south-east England regional secretary for Unite the Union.

Jennie Formby grew up with an older brother and sister in Malta, Bath and Salisbury.

Jennie Formby went to Bath High School for Girls then St Helen and St Katharine boarding school in Abingdon, paid for by the Royal Navy from the age of 14.

Jennie Formby became a trade unionist when she began her working life in Salisbury at the bookmakers William Hill in the late 1970s, and became a branch secretary in Unite's predecessor, the Transport and General Workers' Union.

Jennie Formby later worked for BOC in Southampton, where she became a union shop steward.

Jennie Formby became a Transport and General Workers' Union regional officer in 1988.

Jennie Formby represented a Southampton University Hospitals NHS Trust nurse in a ground-breaking employment tribunal case in 2004, where the black nurse suffered racial discrimination by being banned from caring for a white baby.

Jennie Formby became the union's national officer for the food, drink and tobacco sector in 2004.

In March 2016, Jennie Formby moved to the post of regional secretary in south-east England.

Since late 2011, Jennie Formby has been a member of the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party.

In February 2018, Jennie Formby announced she was a candidate to become General Secretary of the Labour Party, shortly after the incumbent, Iain McNicol, resigned.

Jennie Formby resigned on 4 May 2020, a month following the election of Keir Starmer as new Labour leader, saying "now we have a new leadership team it is the right time to step down".

Jennie Formby married Freddie Formby in 2000 and the couple had two children together and adopted a third.

In March 2019, Jennie Formby announced that she was to undergo treatment for breast cancer.