Stephen Benn, 3rd Viscount Stansgate

His father, Tony Benn, and younger brother, Hilary Benn, have both been senior Labour politicians. His mother was Caroline Benn and his sister is Melissa Benn, a feminist writer.

He is a graduate of Keele University. He was an elected Member of the Inner London Education Authority from 1986 to 1990.

Lord Stansgate has a daughter, Emily, born in 1989, and a son, Daniel John Wedgwood Benn, born in 1991. Emily, an investment banker by occupation, pursued a political career, and sat on the Croydon London Borough Council as a Labour member until she resigned in 2016.

In 2011, he was appointed director of parliamentary affairs for the Society of Biology after spending two decades in a similar role for the Royal Society of Chemistry.[3]

Benn succeeded to the title of Viscount Stansgate on the death of his father in March 2014, a title he officially accepted prompting speculation that he might take advantage of his entitlement to stand for election as a hereditary peer in the House of Lords upon the next hereditary vacancy.[3][4][5][6] His active acceptance of the title was recorded on 10 November 2014 with a note in the minutes of Proceedings from the House of Lords, stating:[7]

"The Lord Chancellor reported that Stephen Michael Wedgwood Benn had established his claim to the Viscount of Stansgate in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. The Clerk of the Parliaments was accordingly directed to enter Viscount Stansgate on the register of hereditary peers maintained under Standing Order 10(5)."

• Father's obituary