Oliver Coppard

Oliver James Coppard (born 9 June 1981) is a British Labour and Co-operative politician serving as the strategic authority mayor for South Yorkshire since 2022. He was re-elected in 2024.

Early life and education Coppard attended Silverdale School and High Storrs School.

He was awarded a bachelor's degree in Politics and Parliamentary Studies from the University of Leeds. During his tenure at Leeds, he interned in the office of Dick Gephardt, then the Democratic Leader in the US House of Representatives. Coppard later interned in the office of Meg Munn when she was Member of Parliament for Sheffield Heeley. He failed to defeat Clegg but achieved a swing of over 16% from the Liberal Democrats to Labour. Coppard has stated that he chose not to contest the seat in 2019 due to Labour antisemitism.

In the 2022 South Yorkshire mayoral election, Coppard was selected as the Labour candidate. He won the election, getting a plurality of votes in the first round, at 43.1% and defeating the Conservative candidate Clive Watkinson by a margin of 71.4% to 28.6% in the second round. Coppard told the Yorkshire Post that he established the programme because he knew that 'one in nine babies that go home from hospital in Sheffield alone go home without a safe place to sleep' and they can 'end up sleeping in a bath or a box, a drawer, in a bouncy chair'. The scheme is delivered by the UK charity Baby Basics, who had already established the need and the format for addressing it.

On 22 March 2024, under Coppard's leadership the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority formally brought the Supertram under public control. This move was welcomed by commentators, with Matthew Topham from Better Buses for South Yorkshire calling 'a day of celebration when our local transport will be run by and for the people it serves' and a Sheffield Councillor called it a 'brave decision' that deserves 'all of our support' in a column for the Sheffield Telegraph. Plans to bring the tram under SYMCA ownership had been set in motion by the previous mayor, Dan Jarvis.

Personal life Coppard is a resident of Sheffield. He is Jewish. Coppard is the Board Chair at the Sheffield Hallam Students' Union.