Yvette Cooper

Yvette Cooper is a British politician and lifelong member of the Labour Party. One of the highest-ranking women in the party, she has served in a number of prominent roles—including chief secretary to the treasury, secretary of state for work and pensions, shadow home secretary, and secretary of state for the home department—since first being elected to Parliament in 1997. On September 5, 2025, she was appointed secretary of state for foreign, Commonwealth, and development affairs.

Early life and education

Raised in Hampshire, England, Cooper is one of two daughters born to steadfast Labour parents June Cooper (née Iley), a former mathematics teacher, and Tony Cooper, who served as general secretary of two professional trade unions and held senior board member roles in the British nuclear industry. She credits her father with instilling some of her earliest political values by having her accompany him to marches for jobs. She recalls that, as part of her first job, she picked fruit and learned to drive a tractor. She also attended Eggar’s School and Alton College.

Cooper continued her studies at Balliol College, Oxford, graduating with a first-class degree in philosophy, politics, and economics in 1990. She went to Harvard University for a year after being awarded a scholarship in 1991 to study at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, after which she received a master’s degree in economics at the London School of Economics.

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Career

Cooper began her career working as a policy researcher for Labour Party leader John Smith. In 1992 she worked for a time on Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign in Arkansas before returning to Britain to resume her research for Smith. She later served as an adviser to Labour Party politician Harriet Harman and was instrumental in developing the party’s New Deal policy, which sought to help unemployed people in returning to work. In 1995 Cooper began working as the lead economics correspondent for The Independent. She remained with the newspaper until 1997, when she was elected to Parliament as MP for Pontefract and Castleford.

During Cooper’s first speech in the House of Commons she spoke about the hard-working people in her constituency and their unemployment struggles. Although the constituency has undergone boundary and name changes in subsequent elections, she has continued to represent it for more than 25 years. She was most recently reelected MP for Pontefract, Castleford, and Knottingley in 2024.

Cooper received her first government post in 1999, when she was named undersecretary for the department of health. From 2002 to 2003 she served as secretary for the lord chancellor’s department, before becoming undersecretary of the office of the deputy prime minister, where she oversaw regeneration and regional development policies, from June 2003 to May 2005.

On May 10, 2005, Cooper received her first ministerial appointment when she was promoted within the office of the deputy prime minister to housing minister under Tony Blair. She held the post until 2008, when Gordon Brown named her chief secretary to the treasury, making her the first woman to hold the position. In 2009 she was appointed secretary of state for work and pensions, a post she held until the Labour Party lost power in 2010.

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Over the years Cooper has won widespread respect for her intellect and commitment. Former home secretary Alan Johnson has described her as “sane, rational, and intelligent,” adding that “she understands things very quickly. And she is tremendously calm. I can’t think of a single occasion in 13 years [of government] when I saw her lose her cool, and that’s remarkable given the kinds of jobs she was doing.”

For her part, she is pragmatically passionate about the role of politics in the lives of people, saying, “It is not enough to be angry at the world—you have to change the world. That is what we are about in the Labour Party.”

Cooper served in several senior cabinet roles during the Labour Party’s years of opposition, including shadow secretary of state for work and pensions, shadow foreign secretary and minister for women and equalities, and shadow secretary of state for the home department.

When the Labour Party returned to power in July 2024, Cooper became home secretary under Prime Minister Keir Starmer. This was a role she had years of experience in, but when Starmer shuffled his cabinet in September 2025, he appointed her secretary of state for foreign, Commonwealth, and development affairs.

One of her first tasks was dealing with Peter Mandelson, the British ambassador to the United States, for his relationship with convicted American sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. While Mandelson was ultimately fired by Starmer, Cooper said that she “did take the action of withdrawing him as U.S. ambassador.” It would be far from her most uncomfortable moment as a leader of the Labour Party. In June 2026, after an abysmal showing by Labour in local elections, she was a strong voice in advising Starmer to resign. With Andy Burnham succeeding Starmer as prime minister, Cooper had made clear that she would like to stay in her current role, positioning herself as a leader in the British government on issues such as the Iran war, the nature of alliances, and the national security threat posed by artificial intelligence. However, Burnham replaced Cooper in the role of foreign secretary with Ed Milliband. Cooper was named Burnham’s health secretary.

Throughout her political career Cooper has advocated strong policies to tackle unemployment, create better-quality jobs, and guarantee work and training for both young people and older workers facing age discrimination. She has fought for women’s rights and gender equality in the workplace as well as put measures in place to combat violence against women.