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Daughter of key Blair adviser given ministerial job
Junior minister role in the Cabinet Office for new MP Georgia Gould among 40 appointments made by Starmer for his new government
The daughter of a guru to Sir Tony Blair is among five new MPs given ministerial jobs by Sir Keir Starmer.
Georgia Gould, 38, the daughter of the late Baron Gould of Brookwood, a key New Labour adviser, has been made a junior minister in the Cabinet Office in a series of more than 40 appointments on Tuesday evening.
Her father was Sir Tony’s strategy and polling adviser who helped guide the party to a historic three election victories in 1997, 2001 and 2005.
He also worked with Neil Kinnock to modernise the party.
Ms Gould, 38, now the MP for Queen’s Park and Maida Vale, in west London, previously failed in an attempt to be selected as a Labour candidate in 2012, before going on to lead Camden council from 2017 to 2024.
Kirsty McNeill, a former adviser to Gordon Brown and the new MP for Midlothian, has been appointed a junior minister in the Scottish Office.
After criticism for not giving the veterans’ minister a seat in Cabinet, Sir Keir has appointed newly elected Alistair Carns to the post.
A former colonel in the Royal Marines, he was mentioned in dispatches and won the Military Cross during service in Afghanistan.
Mr Carns, 44, quit the Armed Forces after a 25-year career to stand for Labour in Birmingham Selly Oak, where he won a majority of 11,537.
The two other new MPs promoted on to the frontbench are Miatta Fahnbulleh, the MP for Peckham, who is an energy minister and Sarah Sackman, MP for Finchley and Golders Green, is the new solicitor-general.
Jess Phillips, the MP for Birmingham Yardley, becomes a Home Office minister, where she is expected to take the brief for domestic violence and safeguarding, a role she had on the opposition frontbench from 2020 to 2023.
Sir David Hanson, a former MP and former parliamentary private secretary to Sir Tony, becomes the fifth person to be elevated to the Lords and join Sir Keir’s government.
A former Home Office minister who served in both Sir Tony’s and Mr Brown’s governments, the newly ennobled Lord Hanson will return to the department as a minister of state.
Sir David lost his seat in the 2019 general election to the Conservatives and was knighted the following year.
Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow paymaster general who played a key role during the election in putting the party’s case in the broadcast media, has been made chief executive of Labour Together, a Starmerite think tank.
His defeat in Leicester South by a pro-Palestinian independent candidate was one of the biggest upsets on election night.
There is, however, no place in the announcement of more than 42 ministerial appointments for Emily Thornberry, the shadow attorney general who was overlooked for the job. She said she was “sad and surprised” to have been left out of the Cabinet.