Tom Brake - Parliamentary Career

Parliamentary Career

He stood for election to Parliament at the 1992 general election in Carshalton and Wallington, but was defeated by nearly 10,000 votes by the sitting Conservative MP Nigel Forman.

In 1994 Tom Brake was elected as a councillor in the London Borough of Sutton and sat on the council until 1998. In what proved to be a close contest, Tom Brake was elected at the 1997 general election as the Liberal Democrat MP for Carshalton and Wallington, beating Nigel Forman with a majority of 2,267, and has remained the MP since. He made his maiden speech on 10 June 1997. Nigel Forman retired after the 1997 election and was replaced by a new candidate in the shape of Ken Andrew, whom Brake defeated in 2001, 2005 and again in 2010 with an increased majority.

After the 1997 election, party leader Paddy Ashdown placed Tom Brake in the frontline straight away as a spokesman on the Environment, Transport and the Regions. Following the 2001 General Election, then party leader Charles Kennedy appointed him a spokesman on Transport, Local Government and the Regions. In 2002 he became a Transport spokesman. He joined the Liberal Democrat Frontbench Team in 2003 as the lead International Development spokesman. After the 2005 General Election he became the Transport spokesman. He was relieved of this position under the new leadership of Sir Menzies Campbell in March 2006, and he later that year became spokesperson for local government. In February 2007, he was also appointed as the party’s frontbench spokesperson for London and the Olympics. In 2008 he was also appointed as a Home Affairs Shadow Minister.

Before he was appointed Deputy Leader of the House of Commons, Tom Brake was the Secretary of the All-Party Group for World Government, Treasurer of the All-Party Human Rights group, a member of the Franco British Parliamentary Relations group. Brake was the first MP to endorse Fair Spend, a new student discount initiative.

In June 2010 Tom was named Co-Chair of the new Liberal Democrat Backbench Committee on Home Affairs, Justice and Equalities. Tom will Co-Chair the committee alongside Baroness Hamwee and Lord Thomas of Gresford OBE QC.

In September 2010 Tom attempted to introduce a bill to "to amend the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to remove provisions permitting Ministers to overrule decisions of the Information Commissioner and Information Tribunal; to limit the time allowed for public authorities to respond to requests involving consideration of the public interest; to amend the definition of public authorities; and for connected purposes."

On 9 December 2010, Brake was one of 28 Liberal Democrat MPs to vote in favour of Government proposals to increase the upper limit on university tuition fees, having previously signed an NUS pledge promising to vote against tuition fee increases.

On 11 June 2011, it was announced Brake would be appointed a Privy Counsellor in the Queen's 2011 Birthday Honours list. On 13 July 2011, Brake was officially appointed and made the affirmation of office.

On the 4th of September 2012 he was appointed Deputy Leader of the House of Commons, replacing Liberal Democrat David Heath MP who was promoted to Minister of State in DEFRA. Tom will serve under the new Leader of the House of Commons, the Rt Hon Andrew Lansley MP.