Member of Parliament
In Parliament, Milburn allied himself with the Blairite modernisers in the Labour Party, becoming close to Tony Blair who sat for the next-door constituency of Sedgefield. This led to his appointment as Minister of State at the Department of Health when Labour came into government in 1997, an important post in which he had responsibility for driving through Private Finance Initiative deals on hospitals. In the reshuffle caused by Peter Mandelson's resignation on 23 December 1998, Milburn was promoted to the Cabinet as Chief Secretary to the Treasury.
Read more about this topic: Alan Milburn
Famous quotes containing the words member of, member and/or parliament:
“I cannot be indifferent to the assassination of a member of my profession, We should be obliged to shut up business if we, the Kings, were to consider the assassination of Kings as of no consequence at all.”
—Edward VII (1841–1910)
“And the member for the constituency
Feeds the five thousand, and has plenty back.”
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)