John Christopher Courtenay Stevens (born 23 May 1955) is a British

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking ...

. A

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

Member of the European Parliament A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its ...

(MEP) from 1989 to 1999, he contested the Buckingham constituency in the 2010 general election as an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

, against Commons speaker

John Bercow John Simon Bercow (; born 19 January 1963) is a British former politician who was Speaker of the House of Commons from 2009 to 2019, and Member of Parliament (MP) for Buckingham between 1997 and 2019. A member of the Conservative Party prior t ...

and came second with 10,331 votes (21.4%) compared to Bercow's 22,860 (47.3%).

Background

Stevens was educated at Winchester, where he won the Boxing Cup, and at Magdalen College, Oxford, taking a third class honours degree in law. He then worked as a foreign exchange and bond trader for

Morgan Grenfell Morgan, Grenfell & Co. was a leading London-based investment bank regarded as one of the oldest and once most influential British merchant banks. It had its origins in a merchant banking business commenced by George Peabody. Junius Spencer Morgan ...

. He was the

(MEP) for

Thames Valley The Thames Valley is an informally-defined sub-region of South East England, centred on the River Thames west of London, with Oxford as a major centre. Its boundaries vary with context. The area is a major tourist destination and economic hub, ...

from

1989 File:1989 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Cypress structure collapses as a result of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, killing motorists below; The proposal document for the World Wide Web is submitted; The Exxon Valdez oil tanker runs ...

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoot ...

, before leaving the party in protest over its increasingly Eurosceptic positioning. He then co-founded, along with

Brendan Donnelly Brendan Kevin Donnelly (born July 4, 1971) is a former Major League Baseball relief pitcher. A right-hander, Donnelly pitched for twenty-one teams (two of them independents), twelve organizations, two independent leagues, eleven organized minor ...

, the

Pro-Euro Conservative Party The Pro-Euro Conservative Party was a British political party announced by John Stevens and Brendan Donnelly in February 1999, formed to contest the 1999 European Parliament election. The founders were Members of the European Parliament who had ...

(PECP) in that year. He contested the

1999 Kensington and Chelsea by-election The Member of Parliament for Kensington and Chelsea, The Rt. Hon Alan Clark (Conservative), died of a brain tumour on 5 September 1999. This was the first safe Conservative seat to have a by-election in the 1997–2001 UK Parliament. There wa ...

for the PECP and came fourth. The PECP was wound up in 2001 and Stevens joined the Liberal Democrats. He left the party in 2010 to stand in the 2010 general election against the Commons Speaker,

, and the leader of the

UK Independence Party The UK Independence Party (UKIP; ) is a Eurosceptic, right-wing populist political party in the United Kingdom. The party reached its greatest level of success in the mid-2010s, when it gained two members of Parliament and was the largest par ...

Nigel Farage Nigel Paul Farage (; born 3 April 1964) is a British broadcaster and former politician who was Leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) from 2006 to 2009 and 2010 to 2016 and Leader of the Brexit Party (renamed Reform UK in 2021) from 2 ...

, in Buckingham. He stood for the Rejoin EU party at the

2021 London Assembly election The 2021 London Assembly election was held on 6 May 2021 to elect the members of the London Assembly, alongside the 2021 London mayoral election. The mayoral and Assembly elections were originally to be held on 7 May 2020, but on 13 March 2020 i ...

References

External links

Buckingham Campaign For Democracy
1955 births Living people Conservative Party (UK) MEPs Alumni of Magdalen College, Oxford People educated at Winchester College MEPs for England 1989–1994 MEPs for England 1994–1999 Pro-Euro Conservative Party MEPs Liberal Democrats (UK) politicians Politicians of the Pro-Euro Conservative Party British political party founders {{UK-MEP-stub