Dame Andrea Jacqueline Leadsom is a British politician serving as Member of Parliament for South Northamptonshire since 2010.
74 Facts About Andrea Leadsom
2.
Andrea Leadsom was elected to the House of Commons at the 2010 general election.
3.
Andrea Leadsom served as Economic Secretary to the Treasury and City Minister from 2014 to 2015 and Minister of State for Energy from 2015 to 2016.
4.
Andrea Leadsom was a prominent member of the Leave campaign during the 2016 referendum on EU membership, and gained standing in referendum TV debates.
5.
On David Cameron's resignation, Andrea Leadsom became one of five candidates in the 2016 Conservative Party leadership election.
6.
Andrea Leadsom served in the May government as Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2016 to 2017.
7.
Andrea Leadsom stood as a candidate to succeed May as leader of the Conservative Party in June 2019 but was eliminated in the first round of voting, finishing 8th out of 10 candidates with 11 votes.
8.
Andrea Leadsom left the Cabinet in the 2020 cabinet reshuffle and remains in the House of Commons as a backbencher.
9.
Andrea Leadsom was born on 13 May 1963 in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, the daughter of Richard and Judy Salmon.
10.
Andrea Leadsom clashed with the head of Barclays Investments who tried to persuade her to return to full-time work soon after a pregnancy, and she left the company in 1997.
11.
From 1997 to 1999, Andrea Leadsom served as Managing Director of De Putron Fund Management.
12.
Andrea Leadsom was Head of Corporate Governance and a Senior Investment Officer at Invesco Perpetual from 1999 to 2009.
13.
Andrea Leadsom's role was to work on "special projects", mostly for the Chief Investment Officer, which included negotiating pay terms for senior fund managers.
14.
Andrea Leadsom never claimed to have personally been a fund manager, and Bob Yerbury, former Chief Investment Officer at Invesco Perpetual and Andrea Leadsom's former manager, dismissed the controversy about how she described her time there and described her as "totally honest".
15.
Andrea Leadsom was a Councillor on South Oxfordshire District Council between 2003 and 2007.
16.
Andrea Leadsom was placed on the Conservative A-List and later chosen to represent the newly created seat of South Northamptonshire.
17.
Andrea Leadsom was selected to stand as the parliamentary candidate in the newly-created South Northamptonshire constituency in June 2006.
18.
Andrea Leadsom made her maiden speech on 22 June 2010 during the budget debate, when she spoke of restoring health to the financial sector, drawing from personal experience in financial regulation, particularly with Barings Bank.
19.
On 25 October 2011, Andrea Leadsom was one of 81 Conservative MPs to defy the party whip and vote in favour of holding a referendum on the UK's membership of the European Union.
20.
Andrea Leadsom was one of five MPs to abstain from the Government's Marriage Bill by voting in both lobbies.
21.
In October 2013, Andrea Leadsom was appointed by David Cameron to the Number 10 Policy Unit, with responsibility for part of the public services brief.
22.
On 9 April 2014 Andrea Leadsom was appointed Economic Secretary to the Treasury following Maria Miller's resignation from the Cabinet.
23.
Andrea Leadsom was given the additional responsibility of City Minister, a post which had previously been held concurrently with the position of Financial Secretary to the Treasury.
24.
Andrea Leadsom was instrumental in introducing the UK Government's first Islamic bonds, the Sukuk.
25.
Andrea Leadsom was monomaniacal, seeing the EU as the source of every problem.
26.
Andrea Leadsom alienated officials by continually complaining about poor drafting.
27.
Andrea Leadsom was financed by loans from the Jersey arm of Kleinwort Benson, a private bank.
28.
Andrea Leadsom is owned by her brother in law, whose family is based in the British Virgin Islands.
29.
Andrea Leadsom was re-elected as MP for South Northamptonshire on 7 May 2015 with 36,607 votes, compared to her nearest rival Lucy Mills, with 10,191 votes.
30.
On 11 May 2015, Andrea Leadsom, who had previously opposed wind farms and European renewable energy targets, was moved from Economic Secretary to the Treasury, to be appointed Minister of State at the Department of Energy and Climate Change, reporting to Amber Rudd who was promoted to Secretary of State at the same department.
31.
In 2015 Andrea Leadsom announced the end of taxpayer funded subsidies for onshore wind farms, stating "we now have enough onshore wind in the pipeline to be sufficient to meet our renewable electricity aims".
32.
Andrea Leadsom took a prominent role in the campaign to leave the EU in June 2016.
33.
Andrea Leadsom argued that the Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, had destabilised financial markets and jeopardised the Bank's independence by warning of short-term negative effects on the economy caused by leaving the EU.
34.
Andrea Leadsom said that the UK economy is too large to need the single market, but is hindered by the slowness of EU trade procedures.
35.
Andrea Leadsom was one of the early favourites to become the next Prime Minister, and was linked with a possible role as Chancellor.
36.
Andrea Leadsom said she would trigger Article 50 immediately upon becoming Prime Minister, and conduct swift negotiations with the European Union.
37.
On 11 July 2016, Andrea Leadsom announced she would be withdrawing her leadership bid, leaving Theresa May as the successor to David Cameron.
38.
Andrea Leadsom promised to "banish the pessimists" and to provide prosperity for the UK if elected, and stated that she was committed to fair trade.
39.
On 6 July 2016 The Times and other news media published articles which said that Andrea Leadsom had overstated her private sector experience and responsibilities.
40.
Penny Mordaunt, a Andrea Leadsom supporter, described the reports as "a concerted effort to rubbish a stellar career".
41.
Andrea Leadsom then issued an amended CV, which The Guardian said listed both deputy financial institutions director, and financial institutions director roles at Barclays.
42.
Andrea Leadsom defended her CV in a BBC interview, saying claims of it being exaggerated were "ridiculous".
43.
Andrea Leadsom said that she "did not want this to be 'Andrea has children, Theresa hasn't' because I think that would be really horrible".
44.
Andrea Leadsom's comments were widely criticised with fellow Conservative MPs including Sarah Wollaston and Anna Soubry suggesting the remarks showed she lacked the judgement to be Prime Minister and calling upon her to withdraw.
45.
Andrea Leadsom promised to publish her tax returns when she made it to the final ballot of the leadership election.
46.
On 11 July 2016 Andrea Leadsom withdrew from the Conservative leadership election, stating that she did not have enough support for her cause, with only a quarter of the votes from the parliamentary party.
47.
The previous day The Sunday Times had reported a rumour that up to 20 Tory MPs would quit the party if Andrea Leadsom won the leadership contest; this was later supported by reports in other news media but "denied by MPs" according to The Guardian.
48.
Andrea Leadsom had been under pressure from the news media, with reports criticising her exaggeration of business and management experience and her suggestion that motherhood strengthened her candidacy for Prime Minister.
49.
Andrea Leadsom charged The Times with "gutter journalism" in response to the article about the motherhood issue.
50.
On 14 July 2016, following Theresa May's election as Leader of the Conservative Party, and the formation of the first May ministry, Andrea Leadsom was appointed to the cabinet as Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.
51.
On 11 June 2017, Andrea Leadsom was appointed Leader of the House of Commons and Lord President of the Council.
52.
On 19 July 2018, Andrea Leadsom proposed, as an amendment to the Independent Complaints and Grievance Policy, that the identity of any MP under investigation by the commissioner for standards should be kept confidential.
53.
Andrea Leadsom claimed that this move was "not about rolling back transparency" but rather "to put confidentiality at the heart of the process for the sake of the complainant".
54.
On 14 January 2019, Andrea Leadsom was criticised in the House of Commons by the Speaker of the House, John Bercow for the failure of the government to advance the cause of proxy voting for expectant mothers.
55.
On 31 January 2019, Andrea Leadsom said the House of Commons' February recess from 15 to 24 February would be cancelled to free up time to pass the necessary Brexit-related legislation.
56.
On 8 May 2019, Andrea Leadsom stated she was "seriously considering" a bid for the party leadership.
57.
Andrea Leadsom officially announced her candidacy for the party leadership on 25 May 2019, the same day that Matt Hancock and Dominic Raab announced they were running.
58.
Andrea Leadsom was proposed and seconded by fellow MPs Chris Heaton-Harris and Heather Wheeler.
59.
Andrea Leadsom was eliminated from the contest in the first ballot, on 13 June 2019, and came overall in eighth place out of ten candidates.
60.
On 24 July 2019, following Boris Johnson's election as Leader of the Conservative Party, and the formation of the first Johnson ministry, Andrea Leadsom was appointed Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.
61.
Andrea Leadsom was given a police escort through crowds gathered for a People's Vote rally, who were protesting for a further public vote on Brexit.
62.
Andrea Leadsom retained her seat with an increased majority at the 2019 general election.
63.
In May 2020 the environmental law charity ClientEarth unsuccessfully sued the UK Government after Andrea Leadsom approved proposals for the expansion of the gas-fired Drax Power Station in Yorkshire.
64.
On 13 February 2020, Andrea Leadsom was removed as Business Secretary by Boris Johnson in the first cabinet reshuffle of the second Johnson ministry.
65.
On 3 November 2021, Andrea Leadsom tabled an amendment drawn up by herself to scrap the suspension of Owen Paterson for 30 days due to a breach of Commons advocacy rules regarding lobbying as part of his second jobs.
66.
In July 2022, Andrea Leadsom announced support for Penny Mordaunt in the Conservative Party leadership election and served as Mordaunt's campaign manager.
67.
Andrea Leadsom said in 2016 that she was "absolutely pro-choice" on abortion, but was "keeping an eye on scientific progress which makes foetuses viable earlier".
68.
Andrea Leadsom is concerned about child development, and founded a charity which helps vulnerable mothers to bond with their babies.
69.
Andrea Leadsom said that if she became Prime Minister she would reform the ban on fox hunting to ensure greater protections for animal welfare.
70.
However, in 2016 Andrea Leadsom campaigned for leave in the UK referendum on European Union membership.
71.
Andrea Leadsom added that the democratic consent for the EU in Britain was "wafer thin".
72.
NORPIP was originally set up with funding from the Ana Leaf Foundation, of which Andrea Leadsom's sister Hayley, wife of Peter de Putron, is a trustee.
73.
Andrea Leadsom married business manager Ben Leadsom in 1993, and has two sons and one daughter.
74.
Andrea Leadsom has discussed her Christian faith openly in a video hosted on the website of the all party parliamentary group Christians in Parliament.