Political Career
Marshall-Andrews joined the Labour Party in 1971 and contested the constituency of Richmond, Surrey in October 1974. He was asked to stand for the Medway Constituency in 1992 which he lost to the incumbent Conservative, Dame Peggy Fenner. He is a Member of Association of Labour Lawyers, Greenpeace, and the Woodland Trust.
Marshall-Andrews entered Parliament in the 1997 general election. He is perceived as being on the libertarian-left wing of the Labour Party, and was a member of the Socialist Campaign Group, but unlike other members of this group is not a trade-unionist by background. In spite of this, however, he nominated Gordon Brown (rather than John McDonnell) for the Labour Party leadership and Peter Hain as deputy leader in 2007. After a period of bedding down as a new MP, where he aided in the drafting of the banning of handguns, he became an irritant to the government front bench. He rebelled against the government on multiple occasions (20 of those rebellions being in the 2005 parliament), mainly on legal issues. He was often mentioned as a candidate for backbencher of the year and is widely respected in the Westminster media circuit.
During the night of the 2005 general election, he appeared on national television commenting on his predicted defeat before it had been officially declared, as the only good news Tony Blair would get that night, and launched a scathing attack on the Prime Minister. But he managed to hold on to the seat, with a narrow majority of 213 votes.
His penchant for rebellion, combined with his friendliness towards many Conservative MPs, led him to become unpopular within parts of his own party. According to The Times, senior Labour MPs demanded that the whip be withdrawn from him as an example to the 49 Labour MPs who rebelled against the government's plans to detain terror suspects for 90 days.
On 15 June 2008, with former Labour Cabinet Minister Tony Benn, Marshall-Andrews again rebelled in his support for Conservative MP David Davis' campaign to step down as an MP and force a by-election in his constituency over the bill for a maximum 42-day detention without charge for arrested suspects. Such an action would normally be against party rules, although he believed his withdrawal from the Labour Party whip was improbable because the party was unlikely to put up a candidate against Davis in the by-election. He felt through his action that "the voice of a substantial part of the Labour party may be heard" over a measure which gained strong resistance among Labour MPs and supporters.
On 17 July 2007, he said he would stand down as a Labour MP at the next election.
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