John Pearson is a chartered surveyor and lectures at Northumbria University. He is married and has two grown-up daughters. He has lived and worked for more than 35 years in the constituency, since first coming to Newcastle as a student. He has been a Green Party member for a number of years, and has stood as a councillor in his ward for the past three years as well as elsewhere in the city prior to that. Professionally he is a passionate supporter of sustainable construction and at a personal level he campaigns for local shopping facilities, affordable housing and an ecologically sound transport policy.