Rory Palmer (born 19 November 1981) is a former British Labour Party politician, who currently works for the charity Guide Dogs for the Blind.

Early life

He attended Hartland School (merged with

Portland School Portland is a locality on the western side of Whangarei Harbour in Northland, New Zealand. Whangarei is about 10 km to the north. Tikorangi is a hill to the west with a summit 161 m above sea level. The major industry is Portland Cemen ...

in 2004) in Worksop in north

Nottinghamshire Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The traditi ...

. He studied Social Policy at the

University of York , mottoeng = On the threshold of wisdom , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £8.0 million , budget = £403.6 million , chancellor = Heather Melville , vice_chancellor = Charlie Jeffery , students ...

between 2000 and 2003,

Career

Palmer briefly worked for the Institute for Public Policy Research as a research assistant, before working for nearly five years as a parliamentary assistant to the Labour MPs John Mann and

Peter Soulsby Sir Peter Alfred Soulsby (born 27 December 1948) is a British Labour Party politician serving as Mayor of Leicester since 2011. He was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Leicester South from 2005 until he resigned his seat in April 2011, in or ...

. Having first been elected for the Labour Party as a councillor for the

Eyres Monsell Eyres Monsell is an Ward (electoral subdivision), electoral ward and administrative division in Leicester, England. Geography Eyres Monsell is bounded to the north by the historic village of Aylestone. To the east is the village of South Wigst ...

ward of Leicester City Council in May 2007, he became one of the council's deputy mayors in May 2011.

Political career

In the 2010 general election, he unsuccessfully stood as the Labour Party candidate in the Bosworth constituency in Leicestershire. In the

2014 European Parliament election The 2014 European Parliament election was held in the European Union, from 22 to 25 May 2014. It was the 8th parliamentary election since the first direct elections in 1979, and the first in which the European political parties fielded candid ...

, he was second on the Labour

party list An electoral list is a grouping of candidates for election, usually found in proportional or mixed electoral systems, but also in some plurality electoral systems. An electoral list can be registered by a political party (a party list) or can ...

in the East Midlands constituency but was not elected. After the Labour MEP

Glenis Willmott Dame Glenis Willmott, ('' née'' Scott; born 4 March 1951) is a retired British Labour Party politician who served as leader of the European Parliamentary Labour Party (EPLP) and Member of the European Parliament for the East Midlands. Ea ...

announced in July 2017 that she would stand down in October of that year Palmer succeeded her and became an MEP. He remained in this role until the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the EU on 31 January 2020.

References

1981 births Living people Alumni of the University of York Councillors in Leicestershire Labour Party (UK) parliamentary candidates Politicians from Leicester People from Worksop Labour Party (UK) MEPs MEPs for England 2014–2019 MEPs for England 2019–2020 {{UK-MEP-stub