Name John Rentoul Role Journalist | ||
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Books The Banned List, The Rich Get Richer, Tony Blair: Prime Minister, Tony Blair, Tony Blair B Pbp Similar People Daniel Pearce Jackson, David Aaronovitch, Iain Martin Profiles | ||
Education King's College, Cambridge | ||
John Rentoul & Kirsty Major: Why I got it wrong about Jeremy Corbyn
John Rentoul (born 1958) is a British journalist. He is the chief political commentator for The Independent, and was seen as a "Labour-leaning journalist".
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Biography
Rentoul was born in India, where his father was a minister of the Church of South India. Educated at Wolverhampton Grammar School, he studied History and English at King's College, Cambridge, and worked on an oil rig before becoming a journalist on Accountancy Age.
Rentoul was a journalist on the New Statesman between January 1983 and May 1988, latterly as Deputy Editor, and a political reporter for BBC's On The Record between 1988 and 1995. He became a political correspondent of The Independent in 1995 and the chief leader writer at The Independent from January 1997 before becoming chief political commentator for The Independent on Sunday in 2004. His biography of Tony Blair has passed through several editions. He is a visiting professor in Contemporary History at Queen Mary, University of London.
Fellow journalist Martin Bright has said Rentoul "remains one of the most incisive political columnists writing today, even though he has lost his access to the highest levels of power". In 2011, Total Politics said Rentoul "is probably the most high-profile defender of Tony Blair’s record in the British media, in a year when the mere mention of the former PM’s name provoked boos at the Labour Party conference. His column in The Independent on Sunday has become one of the last bastions of pure, unadulterated Blairism". Rentoul was critical of Ed Miliband's leadership of the Labour Party.
He also maintains a daily blog. He is related to Sir Gervais Rentoul, the Conservative MP who was the founding Chairman of the 1922 Committee.