Siobhain McDonagh - Parliamentary Career

Parliamentary Career

McDonagh was selected to stand in the 1997 election for Labour through an all-women shortlist.

She was first elected in 1997 on her third attempt, defeating the Conservative incumbent, Dame Angela Rumbold, who was her opponent in both 1987 and 1992 General Elections.

McDonagh had a record of loyalty to the Labour Party. Locally, she generally has a reputation for being an assiduous local Member of Parliament holding a weekly surgery along with regular coffee mornings.

After the 2001 election, Tony Blair offered McDonagh the job of being Parliamentary Undersecretary of State for Communities, however she declined the offer and remained a backbencher.

She has been extremely pro-active and instrumental in securing two Academy schools for East Mitcham, an area that suffers from considerable educational underachievement with GCSE results far below the national average. Recently she was also successful along with Merton Council in getting the Secretary of State for Health, Patricia Hewitt, to locate the new critical care hospital at St Helier near the southern edge of her constituency. This overturned a decision by local health chiefs to locate the hospital at the Sutton Hospital site a number of miles away from her Mitcham and Morden constituency.

After the May 2005 General Election she served as PPS to Dr. John Reid in his position as Secretary of State for Defence and from May 2006 to June 2007 Secretary of State for the Home Department. She was appointed to the position of Assistant Whip on 28 June 2007 in the re-shuffle brought about by Gordon Brown becoming Prime Minister.

On 12 September 2008, McDonagh became the first member of the government to call for a leadership contest. McDonagh said "It's about time we let party members and people involved in the Labour Party and the wider community in on that debate" in a BBC interview.