Joe Benton

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Joe Benton MP

Member of Parliament for Bootle
Incumbent
Assumed office 8 November 1990

Born	28 September 1933 (1933-09-28) (age 74) Bootle,Liverpool
Nationality	British
Political party	Labour

Joseph Edward Benton, known as Joe Benton, (born 28 September 1933) British Labour Party politician and is the Member of Parliament for Bootle.

1 Early life
2 Parliamentary career
3 Personal life
4 External links

[edit] Early life

Joe Benton was born in 1933 in Bootle and was educated at the St Monica's Roman Catholic Primary School on Aintree Road and Secondary School in Bootle and the Bootle Municipal Technical College (called the Hugh Baird College of Further Education since 1974 when after merging with the Art College in 1968). On leaving school in 1949 he received an apprenticeship as a fitter and turner. He entered National Service in 1955 with the RAF. In 1958 he joined the Pacific Steam Navigation Company as a personnel officer, remaining in this position until 1981. In 1982 he became a personnel manager with Girobank.

He has been a Justice of the Peace on the Bootle Bench since 1969. He was elected to serve as a councillor on Sefton Borough Council in 1970, serving until his election to Westminster in 1990, and was the Leader of the Council from 1985.

[edit] Parliamentary career

Bootle saw the death of two young Labour MPs in 1990. Allan Roberts died on March 21 after a long battle with cancer and was succeeded at the by-election on May 24 by Mike Carr. Carr died as a result of a heart attack just 57 days after his election on July 20. Benton was selected to fight the second by-election in Bootle. He was elected comfortably on November 8, obtaining 78% of the vote and nearly ten times that of his nearest rival, the Conservative James Clappison. Following the 2001 General Election, he held the safest Labour seat in the country.

Benton was appointed as an opposition whip by John Smith in 1994, but was dropped by Tony Blair after the 1997 General Election.

[edit] Personal life

He married Doris Wynne in 1959 in Bootle and they have four daughters. He votes the Catholic conservative line on issues concerning abortion, embryo research, gay rights and euthanasia. He is one of the older MPs and is in his 70s.