Nick Brown MP

This week, at the Labour Party Conference in Brighton, Nick spoke at two fringe events.  At the Association of North East Councils meeting Nick and the rest of the panel discussed the push to grow our region’s economy around green energy and sustainable technologies. Later in the week Nick joined the Community Union, the G.M.B. [...]

I have known Gordon Brown for 25 years. We were elected to Parliament at the same time in 1983. In opposition we worked together on Labour’s Treasury team led by the late John Smith, and served in John’s shadow administration when he became leader of the Party in 1992. When John tragically died in 1994, [...]

On Monday 2nd June I attended the funeral of Tom Burlison. Tom had died at the age of 71 after a lifetime’s service to the Trade Union and Labour movement. I first met Tom thirty years earlier, when he was the newly elected Regional Secretary of the General and Municipal Worker’s Union, and I was [...]

As part of my role as Government Minister for the North East I’ve had the chance over the past year to see how much the region has changed and how forward-looking our new economic base is.   I’ve visited the New and Renewable Energy Centre out at Blyth – one of the world’s leaders in the [...]

This year marks the 100th anniversary of Peter Curran’s election as Member of Parliament for Jarrow – the first Labour MP in the North East. Nick Brown gave this speech at a dinner held by Jarrow Labour Party to commemorate the event 100 yrs ago this year, in August 1907, the general workers in Belfast [...]

It’s 13 years since the Labour Party last had to choose a new leader and deputy. 2 years earlier, in 1992, I had supported John Smith for leader and Margaret Beckett for deputy. After John’s tragic and untimely death in 1994 I wanted Gordon Brown to stand for leader of the Labour Party, but he [...]

The Labour Party has formed the Government of our country for ten years now. I can still remember the excitement and enthusiasm that accompanied those early days. Now, everything that is difficult for the Government is headline news, its achievements are less prominently reported. Over the last ten years we’ve enjoyed the longest period of [...]

The two main political parties in Great Britain, the Labour Party and the Conservative Party, have very different structures. This reflects the very different history of the two organisations. The Labour Party is essentially made up of four elements. The first is our history, our philosophical background, the idealism and sense of purpose – “for [...]

No English region has benefited more from the big policy decisions made by the Labour Government than the Northern Region. The most important single thing that the Labour Government can do to help the North is to maintain its sense of direction and sense of purpose. The greatest danger facing the Labour Party is that [...]