In London, Lisa Nandy, a member of Parliament of Indian origin re-elected from Wigan, in the northwest of England, will take her place on Saturday at Prime Minister Keir Starmer's Cabinet table as his new Culture Secretary alongside a record number of female ministers .
The 44-year-old MP was named Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport among 11 women chosen for top jobs by Starmer when she hit the ground running after a landslide Labor general election victory on Friday. Rachel Reeves became the first woman to hold the high office of Chancellor of the Exchequer and Angela Rayner the second deputy prime minister in British history.
Nandy, 44, took to social media to say she was “incredibly privileged” to head the UK Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).
"From rugby league to the Royal Opera, our cultural and sporting heritage runs through our towns, villages and cities and is one of our country's greatest assets... The hard work starts today," she said.
Nandy, who was among the last three contenders in the Labor Party leadership race against her boss in January 2020, has been serving in her shadow cabinet since then. She will now take over the Culture Ministry from Lucy Fraser, who was among the Tory ministers who lost their seats in a devastating election for the Tories led by Rishi Sunak.
“I want to say to those people who have brought your disgusting, hateful, racist politics to our city, that the story of Wigan is one of working class people who for 100 years have driven you and your hate out of our city time after time. time. again,” Nandy fumed in her acceptance speech after defeating a far-right reformist UK candidate in her Greater Manchester constituency on Friday.
“So take this result tonight as your marching orders. We are a better city than you. You are not welcome here. You can take your nasty divisive rhetoric elsewhere because we have a job to do,” she said.
The Manchester-born daughter of Calcutta-born academic Dipak Nandy and English mother Luise Byers, she has spoken of her Indian heritage during Labor Party conferences in the past. Her father was known for his work in the field of race relations in Britain.
“Friends, we find ourselves today in a city that faces the ocean, from an island shaped by waves of immigration. "They include many sons of Empire, like my father, who came here from India in the 1950s and, through the fight to create the Race Relations Act, helped shape our national history," he told the party conference. in Brighton a few years ago.
“This is the country we can be. One that lifts our eyes beyond the horizon, to see that together – only together – we will change the lives of people here and around the world,” she stated.
Reflecting on the Indian independence movement led by Mahatma Gandhi, he recalled how a century ago "the seams of my family came together when the Indian independence campaign, supported by my grandparents, had devastating consequences for the textile workers of Lancashire "When the cotton stopped arriving, the factories stopped working and the workers went hungry."
“But members of my family, who worked in those factories, were among those who welcomed Gandhi to Lancashire. Because they knew, as I know, as the first mixed-race woman to hold this position, that solidarity has power and that our struggle is one and the same," she said, referring to Gandhi's famous visit to Lancashire in 1931, when she met factory workers facing difficulties.
The 44-year-old MP was named Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport among 11 women chosen for top jobs by Starmer when she hit the ground running after a landslide Labor general election victory on Friday. Rachel Reeves became the first woman to hold the high office of Chancellor of the Exchequer and Angela Rayner the second deputy prime minister in British history.
Nandy, 44, took to social media to say she was “incredibly privileged” to head the UK Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).
"From rugby league to the Royal Opera, our cultural and sporting heritage runs through our towns, villages and cities and is one of our country's greatest assets... The hard work starts today," she said.
Nandy, who was among the last three contenders in the Labor Party leadership race against her boss in January 2020, has been serving in her shadow cabinet since then. She will now take over the Culture Ministry from Lucy Fraser, who was among the Tory ministers who lost their seats in a devastating election for the Tories led by Rishi Sunak.
“I want to say to those people who have brought your disgusting, hateful, racist politics to our city, that the story of Wigan is one of working class people who for 100 years have driven you and your hate out of our city time after time. time. again,” Nandy fumed in her acceptance speech after defeating a far-right reformist UK candidate in her Greater Manchester constituency on Friday.
“So take this result tonight as your marching orders. We are a better city than you. You are not welcome here. You can take your nasty divisive rhetoric elsewhere because we have a job to do,” she said.
The Manchester-born daughter of Calcutta-born academic Dipak Nandy and English mother Luise Byers, she has spoken of her Indian heritage during Labor Party conferences in the past. Her father was known for his work in the field of race relations in Britain.
“Friends, we find ourselves today in a city that faces the ocean, from an island shaped by waves of immigration. "They include many sons of Empire, like my father, who came here from India in the 1950s and, through the fight to create the Race Relations Act, helped shape our national history," he told the party conference. in Brighton a few years ago.
“This is the country we can be. One that lifts our eyes beyond the horizon, to see that together – only together – we will change the lives of people here and around the world,” she stated.
Reflecting on the Indian independence movement led by Mahatma Gandhi, he recalled how a century ago "the seams of my family came together when the Indian independence campaign, supported by my grandparents, had devastating consequences for the textile workers of Lancashire "When the cotton stopped arriving, the factories stopped working and the workers went hungry."
“But members of my family, who worked in those factories, were among those who welcomed Gandhi to Lancashire. Because they knew, as I know, as the first mixed-race woman to hold this position, that solidarity has power and that our struggle is one and the same," she said, referring to Gandhi's famous visit to Lancashire in 1931, when she met factory workers facing difficulties.
