Polly Toynbee

Mary Louisa "Polly" Toynbee (; born 27 December 1946) is a British journalist and writer. She has been a columnist for The Guardian newspaper since 1998. She is a social democrat and was a candidate for the Social Democratic Party in the 1983 general election. She now broadly supports the Labour Party, although she was critical of its left-wing leader, Jeremy Corbyn. Toynbee previously worked as social affairs editor for the BBC and also for The Independent newspaper. She is vice-president of Humanists UK, having previously served as its president between 2007 and 2012. She was also named Columnist of the Year at the 2007 British Press Awards. She became a patron of right to die organization My Death My Decision in 2021. Background Toynbee was born at Yafford on the Isle of Wight, the second daughter of the literary critic Philip Toynbee by his first wife Anne Barbara Denise (1920-2004), daughter of Lieutenant-Colonel George Powell, of the Grenadier Guards.