John Webster has been active in politics since the late 1960s. He has worked in senior positions in local government and is a long-term critic of Government economic, environmental and foreign policy. He served two terms as Deputy Leader of Cheltenham Borough Council as a Liberal Democrat before returning to the Forest of Dean and re-joining the Labour Party which he had first joined in 1980 and left at the time that it was clear that Britain was to support the war in Iraq. He is member of Jewish Voice for Labour which is led by Jews who are opposed to the actions of the Israeli Government.