1. Jennifer Chapman, Baroness Chapman of Darlington was born on 25 September 1973 and is a British politician and life peer who has served as Minister of State for International Development, Latin America and Caribbean since 2025.
23 Facts About Jenny Chapman
1. 2.
Jenny Chapman previously served as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Latin America and Caribbean from 2024 to 2025.
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Jenny Chapman was political secretary to the Leader of the Opposition, Keir Starmer, from 2020 to 2021.
4.
Jenny Chapman was appointed Chancellor of Teesside University in 2023.
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Jenny Chapman was born in September 1973 in Surrey but moved at a young age to Darlington, where she attended Hummersknott School and Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College.
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Jenny Chapman completed a BSc in psychology at Brunel University in 1996, and later took an MA in archaeology at Durham University in 2004.
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Jenny Chapman had work placements attached to prison psychology departments whilst studying for her undergraduate degree.
8.
Jenny Chapman worked as constituency office manager for Darlington Labour MP Alan Milburn.
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Jenny Chapman was selected to stand for parliament by the local constituency party the following month.
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Jenny Chapman was elected Darlington MP in the 2010 general election with a majority of 3,388.
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Jenny Chapman made her maiden speech in Parliament on 7 June 2010, during which she asked for social network services to be regulated to stop paedophiles.
12.
Jenny Chapman backed the Building Schools for the Future programme.
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In 2011, Jenny Chapman was appointed as Shadow Minister for Prisons.
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Jenny Chapman had previously written policy recommendations on the subject of incarceration, including a recommendation that prison officers should receive training to help them rehabilitate inmates.
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Jenny Chapman became Shadow Minister for Childcare and Early Years in January 2016, but resigned in June of the same year among dozens of Labour frontbench colleagues.
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Jenny Chapman supported Owen Smith in the failed attempt to replace Jeremy Corbyn in the subsequent leadership election.
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Jenny Chapman later rejoined the Opposition frontbench as Shadow Minister for Exiting the European Union.
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Jenny Chapman was one of the many Labour MPs to be defeated at the 2019 general election, losing her seat to Conservative Peter Gibson following 27 years of Labour holding the constituency.
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In February 2021, Jenny Chapman was made Baroness Jenny Chapman of Darlington, of Darlington in the County of Durham, and made her maiden speech on 22 March 2021.
20.
Jenny Chapman was removed as Starmer's political director in June 2021, after what The Times referred to as "months of friction" with Labour MPs, and was re-appointed to the frontbench as Shadow Minister for the Cabinet Office, shadowing Lord Frost at Task Force Europe and the Cabinet Office.
21.
In February 2022, Jenny Chapman won a libel case against The Sunday Times chief political commentator Tim Shipman, resulting in Jenny Chapman receiving substantial damages and legal costs.
22.
In May 2021, Shipman had posted two tweets on Twitter, one attributed to an unnamed Labour Party source, that the court determined meant he had falsely suggested Jenny Chapman had a "secret adulterous relationship" with Labour leader Keir Starmer.
23.
Jenny Chapman married fellow Labour MP Nick Smith in July 2014.