Thomas Edward Neil Driberg, Baron Bradwell (22 May 1905 – 12 August 1976) was a British journalist, politician, High Anglican churchman and possible Soviet spy, who served as a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1942 to 1955, and again from 1959 to 1974. A member of the Communist Party of Great Britain for more than twenty years, he was first elected to parliament as an Independent and joined the Labour Party in 1945. He never held any ministerial office, but rose to senior positions within the Labour Party and was a popular and influential figure in left-wing politics for many years.

The son of a retired colonial officer, Driberg was educated at Lancing and Christ Church, Oxford. After leaving the university without a degree, he attempted to establish himself as a poet before joining the Daily Express as a reporter, later becoming a columnist. In 1933 he began the "William Hickey" society column, which he continued to write until 1943. He was later a regular columnist for the Co-operative Group newspaper Reynold's News and for other left-leaning journals. He wrote several books, including biographies of the press baron Lord Beaverbrook and the Soviet spy Guy Burgess. He retired from the House of Commons in 1974, and was subsequently raised to the peerage as Baron Bradwell, of Bradwell juxta Mare in the County of Essex.

Driberg made no secret of his homosexuality, which he practised throughout his life despite its being a criminal offence in Britain until 1967; his ability to avoid any consequences for his risky and often brazen behaviour baffled his friends and colleagues. Always in search of bizarre experiences, Driberg befriended at various times the occultist Aleister Crowley and the Kray twins, along with honoured and respected figures in the worlds of literature and politics. He combined this lifestyle with an unwavering devotion to Anglo-Catholicism. Following his death, allegations were published about his role over many years as an MI5 informant, a KGB agent, or both. The extent and nature of Driberg's involvement with these agencies remain uncertain.

Driberg was born on 22 May 1905 in Crowborough, a small dormitory town about 40 miles (64 km) south of London. He was the youngest of three sons born to John James Street Driberg, a former officer in the Indian Civil Service, and his wife Amy Mary Irving Driberg (née Bell). The Driberg family had immigrated from Holland about 200 years previously; the Bells were lowland Scots from Dumfriesshire. John Driberg had retired in 1896 after 35 years in Assam, latterly as head of the state's police, and was 65 years old when his youngest son was born. For Tom Driberg, growing up mostly alone with his elderly parents was a stifling experience; he would later describe Crowborough as "a place which I can never revisit, or think of, without a feeling of sick horror".

At the age of eight Driberg began as a day-boy at the Grange school in Crowborough. In his autobiography he mentions in particular two aspects of his time there: learning the "facts of life" from other boys, with extensive experimentation, and his discovery of what he calls "exotic" religion—High Anglicanism. These experiences formed what he called two "conflicting compulsions", soon to be joined by a third—left-wing politics—to shape the ruling passions of his life.

In 1918, when he was 13, Driberg left the Grange for Lancing College, the public school near Worthing on the south coast where, after some initial bullying and humiliation, he was befriended by fellow-pupil Evelyn Waugh. Under Waugh's sponsorship Driberg joined an intellectual society, the Dilettanti, which promoted literary and artistic activities alongside political debate. He began to write poetry; his aesthetic education was further assisted by J. F. Roxburgh, "a magnetically brilliant teacher" who later became headmaster of Stowe School.

Lancing's Gothic chapel gave Driberg the religious atmosphere he sought, though he found the services disappointingly "moderate". By 1920 he was inclining to the political left and was in rebellion against his conservative upbringing. Finding the Labour Party too dull for his tastes, he joined the Brighton branch of the newly formed Communist Party of Great Britain.

After Driberg had risen to responsible positions within the school (deputy head boy, head librarian, and chief sacristan, among others), his Lancing career ended suddenly in the autumn of 1923, when two boys complained about his sexual overtures. To avoid distressing the widowed Amy Driberg (John Driberg had died in 1919), the headmaster allowed him to remain in the school for the remainder of the term, stripped of his offices and segregated from all social contact with other boys. At the end of the term he was required to leave, on the pretext that he needed private tuition to pass his Oxford entrance examination which he had failed the previous summer. Back in Crowborough, after several months' application under the guidance of his tutor, the young lawyer Colin Pearson, Driberg won a classics scholarship to Christ Church, Oxford.