Pat McFadden

Patrick Bosco McFadden (born 26 March 1965) is a British politician who has served as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster since July 2024. A member of the Labour Party, he has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Wolverhampton South East since 2005. McFadden has previously held various junior ministerial positions and shadow portfolios in his parliamentary career between 2005 and 2024.

McFadden attended the Cabinet of Prime Minister Gordon Brown as Minister of State for Business, Innovation and Skills from 2009 to 2010, deputy to Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills Peter Mandelson (when Mandelson was Secretary from the Lords). He was Minister of State for Employment Relations and Postal Affairs from 2007 to 2009, and Parliamentary Secretary for the Cabinet Office from 2006 to 2007. Prior to his election to Parliament in 2005, he served as Political Secretary to the Prime Minister during the second Blair ministry.

In opposition, he served as Shadow Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills in the first Shadow Cabinet of Harriet Harman from May to October 2010. Having failed to be elected in the 2010 Shadow Cabinet election, he was appointed Shadow Minister for Europe by Ed Miliband in 2014 and re-appointed by Jeremy Corbyn in 2015. McFadden was sacked from the front bench by Corbyn in 2016, and remained on the back benches until he was appointed Shadow Economic Secretary to the Treasury in 2020 by Sir Keir Starmer. He was promoted to the shadow cabinet in 2021 as Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury and became Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in 2023.

McFadden returned to the government following Labour's victory in the 2024 general election, and was appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster by Starmer in his ministry.

Early life and career
Patrick Bosco McFadden was born on 26 March 1965 in Paisley, Renfrewshire, in the west of Scotland. He is the son of James McFadden and Annie McFadden (née Gallagher), both native Irish speakers from just outside Falcarragh, a village in the district of Cloughaneely in the north-west of County Donegal in Ireland. As a child, Pat McFadden regularly visited County Donegal. McFadden went to Holy Cross RC Primary School on Calder Street and Holyrood Secondary School in Crosshill, south-east Glasgow. McFadden studied Politics at the University of Edinburgh, gaining an undergraduate Master of Arts (MA Hons) degree in 1988.

He was chair of Scottish Labour Students in 1986–87 before becoming a researcher in 1988 for Donald Dewar, then Labour's Scottish Affairs spokesman. In 1993, he left this role to become a speechwriter and policy adviser to the Labour leader John Smith.

Prior to becoming an MP, he worked in several advisory roles for Tony Blair, both in opposition and government, and was the Prime Minister's Political Secretary from 2002.

Parliamentary career


McFadden was elected as MP for Wolverhampton South East at the 2005 general election with 59.4% of the vote and a majority of 10,495.

In the 2006 reshuffle he was appointed as Parliamentary Secretary for the Cabinet Office. In the 2007 reshuffle he was promoted to Minister of State in the then newly created Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform with responsibility for Employment Relations and Postal Affairs.

In October 2008, when Lord Mandelson replaced John Hutton as Business Secretary, McFadden took on duties as his deputy in order to represent the department in the House of Commons as Mandelson is a peer and can only address the Lords. McFadden was contemporaneously appointed to the Privy Council.

At the 2010 general election, McFadden was re-elected as MP for Wolverhampton South East with a decreased vote share of 47.7% and a decreased majority of 6,593.

Following Labour's defeat in the general election and the resignation of Gordon Brown, McFadden was named in interim leader Harriet Harman's shadow cabinet as Shadow Business Secretary. When Ed Miliband was elected as Labour leader in September 2010, McFadden announced his decision to stand in Labour's shadow cabinet election but was not elected.

In the 2014 Shadow Cabinet reshuffle, Miliband appointed McFadden as shadow minister for Europe.

McFadden was again re-elected at the 2015 general election, with an increased vote share of 53.3% and an increased majority of 10,767.

In the 2015 Labour Party leadership election, he nominated Liz Kendall.

McFadden retained his post as Shadow Business Secretary when Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader but was sacked along with Michael Dugher in January 2016. He was sacked for what the leadership described as repeated acts of disloyalty, including when, responding to a Stop the War article on the Paris bombings, he condemned "the view that sees terrorist acts as always being a response or a reaction to what we in the west do". John McDonnell said that McFadden's remarks, expressed in a question to the Prime Minister and interpreted as an attack on Corbyn, were an example of him undermining the leader's view. McFadden was defended by Ian Austin and Chris Leslie. Jonathan Reynolds and Stephen Doughty expressed support for McFadden in their resignation letters the following day.

He supported Owen Smith in the failed attempt to replace Jeremy Corbyn in the 2016 Labour leadership election.

McFadden voted in favour of the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill to trigger Article 50 and exit the European Union. He was opposed to a no deal Brexit and supports a close trading relationship with the European Union.

At the snap 2017 general election, McFadden was again re-elected, with an increased vote share of 58.2% and a decreased majority of 8,514.

He is associated with the Labour centre-right Labour First grouping and is a vice-chair of Labour Friends of Israel.

McFadden was again re-elected at the 2019 general election, with a decreased vote share of 46.4% and a decreased majority of 1,235.

On 9 April 2020, McFadden was appointed as Shadow Economic Secretary to the Treasury by new party leader Keir Starmer. He was promoted to Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury in the November 2021 shadow cabinet reshuffle.

In the 2023 British shadow cabinet reshuffle, he was appointed Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Labour Party National Campaign Coordinator.

In 2023, McFadden ranked twenty-fifth in the New Statesman's Left Power List due to his desire to enforce fiscal discipline.

Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (2024–present)
After Labour's victory in the 2024 general election, McFadden returned to government and was appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster by Keir Starmer to serve in his ministry.

Personal life
McFadden and his wife, Marianna, have a son and a daughter. He is a supporter of Celtic F.C.