Toby Harris, Baron Harris of Haringey

Who is Toby Harris, Baron Harris of Haringey?

Jonathan Toby Harris, Baron Harris of Haringey is a Labour Party politician in the House of Lords.

Educated at Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School and Trinity College, Cambridge, he went on to become President of the Cambridge Union Society. At Cambridge, he was a member of the Cambridge University Liberal Club.

He is a former councillor and leader of Haringey Borough Council, and was Chair of the Association of London Government. He was made a Life Peer on 5 August 1998 as Baron Harris of Haringey, of Hornsey in the London Borough of Haringey. He was a Haringey councillor for 24 years, and stood down in 2002, two years after being elected to the London Assembly for Brent and Harrow in 2000.

As leader of Haringey Council, he had the job of dealing with the multi-million pound overspending under Bernie Grant's leadership on restoration of Alexandra Palace, which the Council holds in trust for the people of London. He did not accept the decision of the Attorney-General in 1991 that the politically embarrassing overspending by the Council as trustee was unlawful and so could not be charged to the charity. Instead he maintained that the charity "owed" the Council £30m, charged compound interest on this "debt", and tried to offer the whole Palace for sale, a policy his successors are still trying to carry out despite it being stalled in the High Court in 2007.