John Whittaker (born 7 June 1945) is a former UK Independence Party (UKIP) politician who was a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the North West England region from 2004 to 2009. Whittaker was born in Oldham, Lancashire. He was educated at Queen Mary University of London (BSc Physics, 1966) and the University of Cape Town (PhD Physics, 1980; BA Economics, 1982). He is a senior lecturer in economics at Lancaster University. His main research and teaching interests are in monetary policy and macroeconomics, and recently he has taken a particular interest in the problems associated with the single currency.