Maria Eagle - Parliamentary Career

Parliamentary Career

In parliament Eagle was a member of the Public Accounts Committee following her initial election, and in 1999 she was appointed the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of State at the Department of Health, John Hutton. She was promoted to the Tony Blair government following the 2001 general election as a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Work and Pensions, and after the 2005 general election, she was the Minister for Children at the Department for Education and Skills, until the May 2006 reshuffle moved her to Northern Ireland, where she was Minister for more than one department at a time, including a period at the Department for Employment and Learning, on 29 June 2007 she moved to the Ministry of Justice. As part of the reshuffle of Gordon Brown's government in October 2008, she assumed additional responsibility for the Government Equalities Office. In the June 2009 reshuffle she was promoted to Minister of State within the justice department.

When she was first elected to parliament in 1997 she joined her twin sister, Angela Eagle, who had been elected at the previous parliament, to serve as one of the first set of twins in the House of Commons. Another set of sisters, Sylvia Heal and Ann Keen, had both been elected at the 1997 election, also, meaning that neither pair of sisters holds the record for being the first.

She has called for the ban on mink fur farming.

After Labour lost the 2010 general election served in interim Labour leader Harriet Harman's front bench as Shadow Solicitor General and Shadow Justice Minister. In October 2010 Eagle was elected to the Shadow Cabinet of new Labour Party leader Ed Miliband as Shadow Secretary of State for Transport in the Labour Party Shadow Cabinet election.