27 Facts About Debbie Abrahams

Deborah Angela Elspeth Marie Abrahams is a British Labour Party politician who has served as the Member of Parliament for Oldham East and Saddleworth since 2011.

Debbie Abrahams was a member of the Shadow Cabinet of Jeremy Corbyn from 2015 to 2018.

Debbie Abrahams remains in the House of Commons as a backbencher.

Debbie Abrahams was born in Sheffield, West Riding of Yorkshire; her father was a dentist.

Debbie Abrahams was privately educated, going on to study biochemistry and physiology at the University of Salford; her early employment was as a community worker for a charity in Wythenshawe in south Manchester, where she set up job training programmes for teenagers.

Debbie Abrahams later studied for a master's degree at the University of Liverpool.

Debbie Abrahams was head of healthy cities for Knowsley and served on the board of Bury and Rochdale Health Authority.

In 2002, Debbie Abrahams was appointed chair of Rochdale Primary Care Trust.

Debbie Abrahams was Director of the International Health Impact Assessment Consortium at the University of Liverpool between 2006 and 2010.

Debbie Abrahams resigned from the Chair of Rochdale Primary Care Trust in 2007, over the use of private health companies in the National Health Service, which she said was "destroying the NHS".

Debbie Abrahams then joined the Labour Party, declaring that she wanted "to challenge health policy at a local and national level to ensure that it reflects [the] core values" of the NHS.

Debbie Abrahams was appointed by Simon Danczuk, then Labour candidate for Rochdale, as his advisor on health, and she stood for Rochdale Borough Council in Milnrow and Newhey ward in the 2008 local elections.

Debbie Abrahams criticised the local council in Rochdale for failing to address health inequalities in the town.

At the 2010 general election, Debbie Abrahams was the Labour Party candidate for Colne Valley; she made a plea to Liberal Democrat voters to back her in order to stop the Conservatives winning power.

Debbie Abrahams was unsuccessful in her attempt to retain the seat, which had previously been held by Labour, and ended up in third place.

The winning candidate, Conservative Member of Parliament Jason McCartney, said after the election that Debbie Abrahams had run "a good, positive campaign" and that in the light of bad-tempered exchanges between Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, he was not surprised that she was close to coming second.

In December 2010, Debbie Abrahams was placed on a shortlist of three to be the Labour Party candidate for the Oldham East and Saddleworth by-election.

Debbie Abrahams was appointed parliamentary private secretary to Andy Burnham and elected Chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party's Health Committee.

Debbie Abrahams sought to reassure Clinical commissioning groups that the Labour Party's proposed health reforms would not amount to a top-down 'big bang' shake up of the NHS.

Debbie Abrahams was elected as a member of the Work and Pensions Select Committee in July 2015.

In September 2015, Debbie Abrahams was appointed Shadow Minister for Disabled People by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn in recognition on her work with disabled people in the past.

Debbie Abrahams was appointed Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions in June 2016, following Owen Smith's resignation from the Shadow Cabinet in the wake of the EU Referendum result.

Debbie Abrahams's majority narrowed to 1,503 in the 2019 United Kingdom general election.

In 2021, Debbie Abrahams was one of three MPs who successfully took legal action against the Department of Health and Social Care over contracts awarded during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In March 2018, Debbie Abrahams was suspended from her position as Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary whilst she was investigated by the Labour Party over a "workplace issue", reported by several media outlets to be related to claims that she bullied staff; she has vehemently denied the claims, adding that she is the victim of a "bullying culture of the worst kind".

In January 2013, Debbie Abrahams was awarded the Grassroot Diplomat Initiative Award in the Business Driver category, for her campaign to improve late payments affecting small businesses.

Debbie Abrahams married John Debbie Abrahams, a former captain of Lancashire County cricket team, in the late 1980s.