George Galloway

British politician, broadcaster, and writer (born 1954)

George Galloway (born 16 August 1954) is a British politician. He is a former member of the Labour Party, but left in October 2003; later he was in the Respect Party, until this group was wound up in 2016.

Early life

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Galloway was born and raised in Dundee, Scotland. He joined the Labour Party Young Socialists when he was 13 years old.

Career

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In 1983 Galloway became General Secretary of the London charity War on Want. Galloway was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Glasgow Hillhead from 1987-1997 and Glasgow Kelvin from 1997-2005. In 1998, he started a political campaign called the Mariam Appeal. Galloway became the Vice-President of the Stop the War Coalition in 2001. Galloway was thrown out of the Labour Party in 2003 because of some of his actions. From 2004 to 2016, he was a leading figure in Respect. He was MP for Bethnal Green and Bow from 2005-2010. From 29 March 2012 to 8 May 2015 he was the Respect Party MP for Bradford West.

Galloway was a housemate in the 2006 series of Celebrity Big Brother.

Galloway stood in the 2016 London Mayoral election, but came seventh in the vote.

In 2017 Galloway was an independent candidate at the Manchester Gorton by-election. The by-election didn't happen because it was overtaken by the 2017 General Election. Galloway came a distant third with 5.7% of the vote.

In the 2019 general election, Galloway stood in West Bromwich East as an independent. He said he supported Corbyn's leadership and Brexit.[1] He came 6th with 489 votes. In December 2019 he started the Workers Party of Britain, which says it is "economically radical with an independent foreign policy" and "committed to class politics".[2]

He led All for Unity, which he started, in the 2021 Scottish Parliament election. He said he would vote for the Conservative Party on the constituency vote, and for his own party on the list vote.[3] All for Unity got 23,299 votes in the election, or 0.9%.

In the 2021 Batley and Spen by-election he came third with 21.8% of the vote.[4]

He stood in the Rochdale byelection in 2024, again for the Workers Party of Britain.[5] He was elected with 12,335 votes on a 37.6% turnout but wasn't reelected in the 2024 general election.[6]

Personal life

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In 1979, he married Elaine Fyffe; their daughter was born in 1983. The couple divorced in 1999. In 2000, he married Amineh Abu-Zayyad; she divorced him in 2009 for his unreasonable behaviour. He married Rima Husseini in 2007; their sons were born in 2007 and 2011. He married Putri Gayatri Pertiwi in 2012.[7] Their son was born in 2014.

References

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  1. Rodgers, Sienna (2019-11-09). "Ibrahim Dogus replaces Tom Watson as Labour's West Bromwich East candidate". LabourList. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
  2. "Former Bradford MP George Galloway launches new 'Workers Party'". Bradford Telegraph and Argus. 2019-12-16. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
  3. "George Galloway to vote Tory despite saying he would sooner 'poke his eyes out'". The National. 2021-03-01. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
  4. "George Galloway says he will take legal action to challenge by-election defeat". The Independent. 2021-07-02. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
  5. Morgan, William (2024-01-27). "George Galloway throws his hat into the ring for Rochdale by-election". Manchester Evening News. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
  6. "George Galloway wins divisive Rochdale by-election". www.ft.com. Retrieved 2024-03-01.
  7. "Bradford Respect MP George Galloway to be father again". Bradford Telegraph and Argus.

Other websites

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