David Miliband (b. 1965), now president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, is the former Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs of the United Kingdom, in which post he served from June 2007 to October 2010.
Secretary Miliband was educated at Haverstock Comprehensive School in London. After graduating with first class honors in philosophy, politics, and economics from Corpus Christi College, Oxford University, he completed a master’s degree in political science in 1990 at MIT, where he was a Kennedy Scholar. A lifelong soccer player, he also serves as president of the South Shields Football Club.
The secretary believes that his commitment to equality, social justice, and freedom of expression has its roots in his family’s experience. He is the elder son of the late Marxist theoretician Ralph Miliband and Marion Kozak, both of whom fled from the Nazis in Belgium during World War II. The Miliband family holds further distinction in the concurrent service of David Miliband and his brother, the Right Honorable Edward Miliband MP, former Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change.
Although Secretary Miliband recalls that his childhood career ambition was to be a bus conductor, his first job after completing his education was with the National Council for Voluntary Organisations. He then held a position as research fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research, followed by secretary of the Commission on Social Justice, which was set up by Labour Party leader John Smith to work out new approaches to welfare policy. From 1994–1997, the secretary worked as head of policy for Tony Blair before going on to lead the prime minister’s Policy Unit from 1997–2001. A member of Parliament representing South Shields since 2001, he entered the cabinet as Minister of Communities and Local Government in May 2005. He served as Secretary of State at the Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs before being appointed Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs. Secretary Miliband helped to found the Centre for European Reform and has edited two books, Reinventing the Left and Paying for Inequality. He is married to violinist Louise Shackelton; they have two sons.
