Margaret Beryl Jones, Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (born 22 May 1955) is a British Labour Peer and previously a trade union official and Labour politician. She was Chair of the Labour Party from 2000 to 2001. Early life Jones was born in Cardiff to Bill and Audrey Jones, and was educated at Whitchurch High School. She then studied at the University of Sussex, gaining a BA in Sociology. She now lives in Hove. Non-political positions Jones was Director of Policy and Public Affairs of the trade union UNISON until 2006. In 1979 she became a regional official of National Union of Public Employees (NUPE), which merged into UNISON. She has a background as a housing campaigner and environmentalist as well as fighting low pay and discrimination at work. She was previously a trustee of Shelter and the Waste & Resources Action Programme as well as being on the board of the Circle 33 Housing Trust. She has been a Development Board member of ClientEarth, board member of Ombudsman Services, Chair of Rothamsted Enterprises, and President of Friends of the South Downs. Labour Party positions Jones was a member of the Labour Party's National Executive Committee (NEC) within the trade union section from 1993 to 2005. She was elected Chair of the Labour Party in 2000, the year the Prime Minister Tony Blair controversially appointed Charles Clarke to be the similarly named Party Chairman. She was co-convener, along with Tony Blair, of the NEC Joint Policy Committee for much of her time on the NEC. Parliamentary candidate for Blaenau Gwent Jones was the Labour Party parliamentary candidate for the constituency of Blaenau Gwent at the 2005 general election, the safest Labour seat in Wales, and fifth safest in the UK. She was selected from a women-only shortlist which was controversially imposed upon the local party; subsequently eight of twelve members of the local executive resigned in protest. The retiring MP Llew Smith also criticised the selection method. Peter Law, the Labour Welsh Assembly Member for the constituency, resigned from the party and stood against her as an Independent. Prior to the announcement of Law's rumoured candidacy, Jones stated that Law would be "very foolish" to stand against her. She argued "Blaenau Gwent is solidly Labour and I don't think people will vote for anyone else." Law won the seat with a majority of 9,121 votes, creating one of the media highlights