Fraser Kemp - Early Life

Early Life

He attended Biddick Primary School and Washington Comprehensive School (now called Washington School, and former school of Bryan Ferry) on Spout Lane in Washington.

Kemp started work in the civil service from 1975 and was active in the Civil and Public Services Association trade union and in the Clause Four faction that operated inside the Labour Party. He began working full-time for the Labour Party in 1981, having previously, as a teenager, organised successful local election campaigns.

Appointed as party organiser in Leicester - where his long rivalry with Chris Rennard began, by 1984 he was an Assistant Regional Organiser in the East Midlands before being appointed as the, then youngest ever, Regional Organiser for the Labour Party in the West Midlands in 1986.

In that role he came to prominence as the election agent responsible for the two of the biggest swings to the Labour Party in history - firstly in the Mid Staffordshire by-election in 1990 (an election largely fought over the question of the Poll Tax) and then an even bigger swing in Dudley West by-election in 1994, not long after Tony Blair became leader of the Labour Party.

As a result of this success Kemp was posted to the party's headquarters in Millbank Tower in London and became the party's number two member of staff as General Election Co-ordinator in 1994. He held this post until being selected as Labour candidate for Houghton and Washington East - the constituency where he grew up - in late 1996.

In 2001, Kemp unsuccessfully auditioned to be presenter of chair-based quiz show The Chair.