William Ernest Rammell (born 10 October 1959) is a British Labour Party

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 ...

, who was the

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

(MP) for Harlow from

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; '' Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of ...

until 2010, and served as a

Minister of State Minister of State is a title borne by politicians in certain countries governed under a parliamentary system. In some countries a Minister of State is a Junior Minister of government, who is assigned to assist a specific Cabinet Minister. In ...

in several departments from 2002. From August 2012 to December 2019 he was Vice-Chancellor of the

University of Bedfordshire The University of Bedfordshire is a public research university with campuses in Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire, England. The University has roots from 1882, however, it gained university status in 1993 as the University of Luton. The Universi ...

. He was chair of the university consortium MillionPlus from June to December 2019. In August 2021 he became president of the

University of Kurdistan Hewler The University of Kurdistan Hewlêr (UKH) is an educational institution in Erbil/Hewlêr the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. UKH was the fifth public university to be opened in the Kurdistan Region. It was established in 2006. The University Of Kurdista ...

Iraqi Kurdistan Iraqi Kurdistan or Southern Kurdistan ( ku, باشووری کوردستان, Başûrê Kurdistanê) refers to the Kurdish-populated part of northern Iraq. It is considered one of the four parts of "Kurdistan" in Western Asia, which also inc ...

. In September 2022 he became the President o
Zoom Abroad
a UK based Ed-tech company.

Political career

Rammell joined Tony Blair's government in October 2002 as an assistant whip but was promoted two weeks later to be a spokesperson for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Rammell, a pro-European, was supportive of joining the Single European Currency, as until 2002 he was Chair of Labour Movement for Europe. In September 2004, he was the first British government minister to visit

North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...

. In the 2004 documentary Stealing a Nation Rammell defended the British government's continued racist policy of exiling the

Chagos The Chagos Archipelago () or Chagos Islands (formerly the Bassas de Chagas, and later the Oil Islands) is a group of seven atolls comprising more than 60 islands in the Indian Ocean about 500 kilometres (310 mi) south of the Maldives arc ...

islanders in order to maintain a US military installation on

Diego Garcia Diego Garcia is an island of the British Indian Ocean Territory, a disputed overseas territory of the United Kingdom. It is a militarised atoll just south of the equator in the central Indian Ocean, and the largest of the 60 small islands of ...

. In the 2005 general election, Rammell had the third smallest majority of any Labour MP, at just 97 votes. The result was so close that the final declaration had to be delayed until two days after voting, to give exhausted counting officials time to rest. In May 2005, Rammell was made Minister of State for Higher Education. He was strongly supportive of

top-up fees Tuition fees were first introduced across the entire United Kingdom in September 1998 under the Labour government of Tony Blair to fund tuition for undergraduate and postgraduate certificate students at universities; students were required to p ...

claiming in 2005 that without such fees it would be necessary to put "3p or 4p on the standard rate of tax". He elsewhere provided a different estimate stating that to replace the income from top-up fees, estimated by the government to be £1.4 billion., would necessitate a requirement "to put up income tax by 3%" The amount raised by the UK in

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in 2003–2004 was £120 billion. In September 2007, he withdrew funding from some adult and continuing education courses in universities. In February 2008, Rammell announced plans to create a national database of children's school records and exam results which would make up a publicly owned CV. The CV and "Learner Number" would stay with the child throughout adult life until retirement and only the British government would be able to remove records from their database entry. The plan would only have applied to English children, with education being a devolved matter. In October 2008, Rammell returned to the Foreign Office, this time in the role of

, and in June 2009, was moved again to the Ministry of Defence as Minister of State for the Armed Forces. He defended the

Brown government Gordon Brown formed the Brown ministry after being invited by Queen Elizabeth II to form a new administration following the resignation of the previous Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Tony Blair, on 27 June 2007. Brown formed his governm ...

's levels of spending on equipment in

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...

, following a soldier's death because of a lack of available helicopters. In September 2009, Rammell confirmed he had told Libya that the Prime Minister did not want to see convicted Lockerbie bomber

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi ( ar, عبد الباسط محمد علي المقرحي, ; 1 April 1952 – 20 May 2012) was a Libyan who was head of security for Libyan Arab Airlines, director of the Centre for Strategic Studies in Tripoli, Li ...

, who had been serving a

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, die in prison. In October 2009, following

Sir Thomas Legg Sir Thomas Stuart Legg (born 13 August 1935) is a British former senior civil servant, who was Permanent Secretary of the Lord Chancellor's Department and Clerk of the Crown in Chancery, United Kingdom (1989–98). Biography Born in London in ...

's audit, Rammell was ordered to repay £2,782 of wrongful expenses claims. In the 2010 general election, Rammell was defeated in Harlow by

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 ...

candidate

Robert Halfon Robert Henry Halfon (; born 22 March 1969) is a British Conservative Party politician, the Member of Parliament (MP) for Harlow since 2010. Halfon was formerly a researcher for Conservative MPs, including as Chief of Staff to Shadow Chancellor ...

, who gained the seat with a majority of 4,925 votes. On 13 April 2012, it was announced Rammell was to become the new Vice-Chancellor of the University of Bedfordshire, taking up his post in August 2012 for the start of the new academic year. He had previously worked for Plymouth University as Deputy Vice-Chancellor with responsibility for student experience and internationalisation. In November 2019, it was announced that Rammell would step down from his role as Vice-Chancellor at the end of the year.

Voting record

How Rammell voted on key issues since 2001: * Has never voted on a transparent Parliament. * Voted for introducing a smoking ban. * Voted for introducing ID cards. * Voted for introducing foundation hospitals. * Voted for introducing student top-up fees. * Voted for Labour's anti-terrorism laws. * Voted for the Iraq war. * Voted against investigating the Iraq war. * Voted for replacing Trident. * Voted for the hunting ban. * Voted for homosexual marriage.

References

External links

Ministerial responsibilities – DIUS

* ttps://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/bill_rammell/harlow TheyWorkForYou.com Bill Rammell MP
BBC Politics page

News items

Visiting Israel in June 2007

Getting poor people to university in November 2006

Visiting Cuba in March 2005

Visiting North Korea in September 2004

Talking to BBC Breakfast about Harlow in July 2002
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rammell, Bill 1959 births Living people Alumni of Cardiff University Harlow Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies People associated with the University of Bedfordshire People associated with the University of Plymouth People from Islington (district) UK MPs 1997–2001 UK MPs 2001–2005 UK MPs 2005–2010 Ministers for Universities (United Kingdom) Labour Party (UK) councillors Councillors in Essex