34 Facts About Mark Field

Mark Christopher Field was born on 6 October 1964 and is a British politician who served as the Member of Parliament for Cities of London and Westminster from 2001 to 2019.

Mark Field stood down from the British House of Commons at the 2019 United Kingdom general election.

Mark Field's father Peter was a major in the British Army and his mother Ulrike was of German origin.

Mark Field was secretary and national political officer of the Oxford University Conservative Association from 1985 to 1986, JCR president of St Edmund Hall in 1986, and he was news editor of student newspaper Cherwell while it was under the editorships of Christina Lamb and Anne McElvoy.

Mark Field completed his education at The College of Law at Chester, qualifying as a solicitor in 1990.

Whilst an undergraduate at Oxford University, Mark Field became a personal assistant to the Conservative MP for Oxford West and Abingdon, John Patten, before training as a solicitor and practising as a corporate lawyer with Freshfields between 1990 and 1992.

Mark Field served as vice-chairman of the Islington North Conservative Association between 1989 and 1991 and unsuccessfully stood as one of the Conservative Party candidates in the Quadrant ward in the Islington Council election in 1990.

Mark Field was elected as a Conservative councillor for Abingdon ward on Kensington and Chelsea London Borough Council in 1994, standing down in 2002 after entering the House of Commons.

Mark Field unsuccessfully contested the Conservative held seat of Enfield North at the 1997 general election following the retirement of the sitting MP Tim Eggar.

In December 1999 Mark Field was selected to contest the safe Conservative seat of the Cities of London and Westminster following the retirement of former Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Brooke at the 2001 general election.

Mark Field won the seat with a majority of 4,499 and was returned to Parliament with an increased majority three times since.

Mark Field was re-elected with a reduced majority at the 2017 general election.

Mark Field made his maiden speech in the House of Commons on 27 June 2001, when he declared his great political hero to be former Prime Minister Bonar Law.

Mark Field was described by The Guardian as one of the most "hardline right-wingers" up for election in 2001 after comments he made in 1991 about charities fighting the AIDS epidemic were reported.

Mark Field criticised AIDS campaigns as a waste of taxpayers' money and wanted mandatory tests for AIDS: "Many charitable trusts set up to help counter Aids in the mid-1980s became little more than a gay rights front", he wrote in Crossbow in 1991.

Mark Field was one of the Conservative MPs to vote in favour of gay marriage when this became law in May 2013.

Mark Field was appointed an Opposition Whip by Iain Duncan Smith in 2003, becoming the Shadow Minister for London later that year.

In September 2010, Mark Field was appointed by the Prime Minister to the Intelligence and Security Committee, chaired by former Foreign Secretary, Sir Malcolm Rifkind.

Mark Field became the youngest MP on this committee, which reports directly to 10 Downing Street and oversees the UK's intelligence and security services.

Mark Field has served on the Standing Committees of several pieces of legislation, including the Business Rates Supplements Act and the Finance Acts in 2008 and 2009.

Mark Field has run local campaigns on business rates, St Bartholomew's Hospital, assisting the creative industries, the control of rickshaws in the West End, social housing rent rises, the independence of the City of London Police and, in July 2011, successfully argued in Parliament for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport's continuing control of the Royal Parks.

Mark Field expressed criticism of the previous system governing MPs' second home allowances: The Daily Telegraphs investigation of MPs' expenses found Mark Field to be among the lower-end claimants.

In October 2011, Mark Field voiced opposition to Occupy London protestors camped in his constituency.

Mark Field asserted that the Coalition Government's pledge to get "annual net migration down to the tens of thousands" was undeliverable, risked potential harm to the economy and could ultimately be electorally damaging to the Conservative Party.

In March 2015, Mark Field was sworn into the Privy Council of the United Kingdom, thereafter being accorded the honorific prefix of "The Right Honourable".

Mark Field promoted UK expertise across Asia in green finance, renewables, carbon capture utilisation and storage, and electric vehicle technology.

Mark Field said he reacted "instinctively" and referred himself to the Cabinet Office for an investigation.

Mark Field apologised to the activist for "grabbing her" and said he was worried she might have been armed.

The City of London Police reviewed the events and declared that it would be taking no further action because Mark Field was a member of parliament.

When Boris Johnson became prime minister in July 2019, Mark Field was dropped from his ministerial role at the Foreign Office as part of a cabinet reshuffle.

Mark Field has been a regular panellist on BBC Radio 4's Westminster Hour and has appeared on various other BBC television programmes, including Daily Politics, Sunday Politics and Newsnight, ITV's Late Debate and Sky News as a newspaper reviewer.

Mark Field has made contributions to the political blog, ConservativeHome, particularly on economic matters.

Mark Field has written for The Daily Telegraph and City AM, and wrote an article for The Independent about the Christian minority in Syria.

Mark Field had an extra-marital affair between 2004 and 2005 with Liz Truss, who was married; the Conservative Party had appointed him as her political mentor at the time.