Glenys Elizabeth Kinnock, Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead , is a British Labour Party politician and former teacher. She was a Member of the European Parliament from 1994 to 2009. She is the wife of Neil Kinnock, who was leader of the Labour Party from 1983 to 1992. When Neil Kinnock received a life peerage in 2005, Glenys became entitled to the style "Lady Kinnock", which she chose not to use. She was awarded a life peerage when she joined the government in 2009. She and her husband are one of the few couples to both hold life peerages in their own right. From 2010 to 2013 she was the Opposition Spokesperson for the Department of International Development in the House of Lords.
Early life
Glenys Elizabeth Parry was born at Roade, Northamptonshire, and educated at Holyhead High School, Anglesey. She graduated in 1965 from University College, Cardiff in education and history. She met her future husband Neil Kinnock at university and married him in 1967. She worked as a teacher in secondary, primary, infant and nursery schools, including the Wykeham Primary School, Neasden, London. She is a member of the GMB trade union and the Co-operative Party, and was a member of the National Union of Teachers. She speaks Welsh, but she did not pass this heritage on to her son, Stephen Kinnock, who is married to the former Danish prime minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt and through him she has two granddaughters and through her daughter Rachel she has a granddaughter and a grandson.
Kinnock represented Wales in the European Parliament from 1994 until 2009, where she was a member of the Party of European Socialists political group. She was a Member of the European Parliament's Development and Co-operation Committee and a substitute member of the Committee on Citizens' Freedoms and Rights, Justice and Home Affairs. She was a co-president of the African, Caribbean and Pacific-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly from 2002–09, and Labour spokesperson on International Development in the European Parliament. In November 2006, Glenys Kinnock was criticised in the press for "taking a junket" to Barbados to discuss world poverty issues. She was co-presiding over the 12th ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly, which was invited by the Barbados government to discuss international aid and development. On 18 January 2009, Kinnock revealed on the BBC's The Andrew Marr Show that she and Neil Kinnock had received a personal invitation from Joe Biden to attend Barack Obama's presidential inauguration on 20 January 2009 at the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. In 2004, Glenys Kinnock was caught up in an expenses scandal. Fellow MEP Hans-Peter Martin claimed to have caught 194 colleagues receiving the European Parliament's attendance allowance. Kinnock was among those MEPs whom Martin found and filmed leaving the building just moments after they had signed in for the day to qualify for their £175-a-day allowance, in addition to their £70,000 salaries as MEPs.
United Kingdom Parliament
In the 2009 cabinet reshuffle, Kinnock was appointed Minister for Europe following the resignation of Caroline Flint. To enable her to join the government, she was awarded a life peerage and became Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead, of Holyhead in the County of Ynys Môn, on 30 June 2009. She was introduced to the House of Lords on the same day. She is a member of Labour Friends of Israel. In September 2009, The Daily Telegraph listed Baroness Kinnock as the UK's 38th 'Most influential Left-winger', stating: "People working closely with the new minister have asked why on earth better use had not been made of her sooner. She has impressed civil servants and, more importantly, made a good impression on visits and in meetings abroad." From 12 October 2009 to 11 May 2010 Glenys Kinnock served as Minister of State with responsibility for Africa, the Caribbean, Central America and the UN, filling a post left vacant after the resignation of Lord Malloch-Brown.
