John Leslie Prescott (born 31 May 1938) is a Welsh Labour Party politician, former Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, First Secretary of State and current Member of Parliament for the constituency of Hull East. He was elected Deputy Leader of the Labour Party after coming second in the Labour leadership election in 1994, and was appointed Deputy Prime Minister after Labour's victory in the 1997 General Election.

A former ship's steward and trade union activist, he is presented as the political link to the working class in a "New" Labour party led by modernising middle class professionals. Prescott had overcome the handicap of failing his grammar school entrance Eleven Plus examination, to graduate from Ruskin College in Oxford. Prescott also developed a reputation as a key conciliator in the often tense relationship between the two other senior figures in government, then chancellor Gordon Brown and former Prime Minister Tony Blair.

On 27 June 2007, he resigned as Deputy Prime Minister, to coincide with the resignation of Prime Minister Tony Blair, following his replacement in a deputy leadership election by Harriet Harman. His former post of Deputy Prime Minister was not assigned to any minister. On 27 August 2007, he announced that he would not stand for re-election as an MP at the next election.