Munira Wilson
MP
Official portrait, 2019
Member of Parliament
for Twickenham
Assumed office
12 December 2019
Preceded bySir Vince Cable
Majority14,121 (21.9%)
Liberal Democrat portfolios
2020-2021Health, Wellbeing and Social Care
2021-Education
Personal details
Born
Munira Sherali Hassam[1]

(1978-04-26) 26 April 1978
NationalityBritish
Political partyLiberal Democrat
SpouseMichael Robert Wilson[2]
Alma materSt Catharine's College, Cambridge
OccupationPolitician
ProfessionLobbyist
Websitewww.munira.org.uk

Munira Wilson (née Hassam; born 26 April 1978)[3] is a British Liberal Democrat politician who was elected as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Twickenham at the 2019 general election. She succeeded the former Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable as MP. She has served as the Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Education since 2021 under Sir Ed Davey, and previously as the Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Health, Wellbeing and Social Care from 2020 to 2021.

Early life

Munira Hassam was born in 1978[4] to parents of East African Indian heritage. Her parents were both born in Zanzibar. Her father went to study in Britain. Her mother, aged 21 and stateless, fled to Britain during the Zanzibar Revolution. They met in Britain.[5]

She grew up in London and attended Henrietta Barnett School, a state grammar school in north London. She then went on to study at St Catharine's College, Cambridge[6] from 1996 to 2000, where she graduated with a degree in Modern Languages (French and German),[6] including a year abroad as an English assistant in two secondary schools in southern France.

After graduation, she trained as a tax consultant with Ernst & Young. She then switched to working for the Liberal Democrats, becoming the campaigns organiser for Sue Doughty and the Guildford Liberal Democrats in 2004–5, ahead of Doughty losing her Guildford seat at the 2005 general election. She went on to work for newly elected MP Nick Clegg for the first six months of 2006. She subsequently went on to spend over a decade as a lobbyist, until her election to Parliament in 2019, firstly for Save the Children (2006–08), then for Beating Bowel Cancer (2008–09), and Novartis (2009–15), where she rose to become head of government affairs – pharmaceuticals. She then entered the public sector as a strategic account manager at NHS Digital from 2015 to 2016, before returning to lobbying in 2016-9 as corporate affairs director, UK & Ireland for the German science and technology company Merck KGaA Darmstadt.[7]

Political career

Wilson served a term as a councillor on Richmond upon Thames London Borough Council from 2006 to 2010. She contested Twickenham's neighbouring constituency of Feltham and Heston in the 2010 general election, where she came third. In the 2012 London Assembly election she stood in South West constituency.

She was selected in 2019 to replace Sir Vince Cable as the Liberal Democrat candidate in his Twickenham constituency, and went on to hold the seat with an increased majority at the 2019 United Kingdom general election. She won the seat with 36,166 votes (56.1% of the total votes cast), giving her a majority of 14,121 over her Conservative opponent. The Green Party in Twickenham had voted to stand aside to support Wilson.[8]

Wilson has opposed plans for a third runway at Heathrow Airport, and has worked to improve rail services in South West London.[9] Twickenham is on a flight path to Heathrow, and Wilson has stated that "We are absolutely 100% opposed to Heathrow expansion."[10] However, she supports the construction of HS2 high speed rail, saying that "HS2 is a vital project for reducing our carbon emissions and unlocking the economic potential of the North, but Ministers should not be given a blank cheque.".[11] She was appointed Liberal Democrat spokesperson for Health, Wellbeing and Social Care by acting leader Ed Davey in January 2020.[12]

In May 2021, alongside celebrities and other public figures, Wilson was a signatory to an open letter from Stylist magazine which called on the government to address what it described as an "epidemic of male violence" by funding an "ongoing, high-profile, expert-informed awareness campaign on men’s violence against women and girls".[13]

She was appointed Liberal Democrat spokesperson for Health, Wellbeing and Social Care by acting leader Ed Davey in January 2020.[12]

On the 19th May 2021, Wilson in a House of Commons debate on the Israel and Gaza Ceasefire asked the Foreign Secretary to condemn what she claimed was a completely disproportionate response from the Israeli government & suspend arms sales.[14]

In June 2022 she was accused by the RMT union of supporting 'strike-breaking' after she called for the army to be brought in to keep trains running during a televised BBC debate.[15] The Senior assistant general secretary of the RMT, Eddie Dempsey, accused her of "going to war on workers.”[16]

In April 2023 she was reselected for the next general election.[17]

Personal life

Munira Hassam married Michael Wilson at St Stephen's, Twickenham, in 2007.[1][2] She was raised a Muslim and is now a committed Christian.[18][19]

References

  1. 1 2 "London Borough of Richmond upon Thames – Borough Council Election – 4th May 2006" (PDF). 4 May 2006. West Twickenham Ward. Retrieved 23 December 2019.
  2. 1 2 "London Election 3rd May 2012". Retrieved 20 December 2019.
  3. ↑ Brunskill, Ian (19 March 2020). The Times guide to the House of Commons 2019 : the definitive record of Britain's historic 2019 General Election. HarperCollins Publishers Limited. p. 365. ISBN 978-0-00-839258-1. OCLC 1129682574.
  4. ↑ "Feltham and Heston".
  5. ↑ "'We had to fight tooth and nail': BAME parliamentarians talk representation and tackling racism". Politics Home. 25 February 2020. Retrieved 24 November 2021.
  6. 1 2 "Munira Wilson". Snipe. Retrieved 9 December 2020.
  7. ↑ "Munira Wilson's LinkedIn page". Retrieved 12 January 2019.
  8. ↑ "Twickenham Greens voted to stand aside regardless of Unite to Remain". South West Londoner. 10 December 2019. Retrieved 13 December 2019.
  9. ↑ Bayley, Sian (14 November 2019). "The candidates you can vote for in Twickenham". My London. Retrieved 12 December 2019.
  10. ↑ "Twickenham candidates take a stand against Heathrow expansion". South West Londoner. 29 November 2019. Retrieved 12 December 2019.
  11. ↑ Hunt, James. "Ministers must explain to Parliament why HS2 costs have soared". Bradford Liberal Democrats.
  12. 1 2 "Meet our new Commons team". LibDems.org.uk. Liberal Democrats. 6 January 2020. Retrieved 13 January 2020.
  13. ↑ ""We're calling on you to act now": read Stylist's open letter to Priti Patel about ending male violence against women and girls". Stylist. Retrieved 20 May 2021.
  14. ↑ "Israel and Gaza Ceasefire Volume 695". Hansard. 6 January 2020. Retrieved 18 October 2023.
  15. ↑ "Full steam ahead for more rail strikes as PM challenges unions and RMT ups pressure". 26 June 2022.
  16. ↑ https://twitter.com/RMTunion/status/1541007155276439553
  17. ↑ newsdesk2 (14 April 2023). "Munira Wilson reselected by Lib Dems for Twickenham". South West Londoner. Retrieved 15 April 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  18. ↑ Tatari, Eren (6 June 2014). Muslims in British Local Government: Representing Minority Interests in Hackney, Newham, and Tower Hamlets. Brill Publishers. p. 51. ISBN 978-9004269699. For instance, Richmond upon Thames councillor Munira Hassam converted to Christianity from Islam eight years ago; hence is not included in the dataset.
  19. ↑ "Feltham candidates grilled at hustings". MyLondon. 4 May 2010. Retrieved 18 December 2019.
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