backbencher

1. (politics) A Member of Parliament who does not have cabinet rank, and who therefore sits on one of the backbenches or in one of the back rows of the legislature.

2. (education) A student who does not perform well, especially one who sits at the back of the classroom.Examples: "Classmates naturally turn to look at the backbencher, who must acknowledge his presence, with some embarrassment."; "The teacher also gets an idea of the "backbenchers" or the slow students since he can see which desk is still to send an answer."; "When I was in a primary school, I was a backbencher student."

3. (sports) A member of a team who does not usually play, but who is held in reserve.Examples: "During 1994, the national team players were away for a game in January and again during the season-ending league championship tournament in April. The “backbenchers” won all these games."; "The plucky backbencher began his life in hockey as a player, breaking into the professional game with the Pacific Coast Hockey Association's Portland Rosebuds in 1916– 17, but turned amateur again the following season."; "By the second scrimmage of the season he was a backbencher, suspended from the game for disciplinary reasons."

4. (by extension) Someone who does not play an active role in a process.Examples: "As we stated in previous chapters, counselors and other student support personnel have been backbenchers in the ongoing drama of school reform."; "Mayorga was no backbencher in the dirty war. He had been chief of the naval base in Trelew in 1972, when one of the first massacres took place."; "But, Jack was a backbencher in the committee. His main function was to keep an eye on the theatre's income."broadly