Robert Ernest Bean (5 September 1935 – 7 December 1987) was a British Labour Party politician and polytechnic lecturer. Having served as a councillor and fought Thanet East in February 1974, Bean was elected Member of Parliament for the marginal Rochester and Chatham seat in the October of that year, ousting the Conservative incumbent Peggy Fenner. At the 1979 general election, when the Conservatives returned to government under Margaret Thatcher, Fenner regained the seat.