.png?1410539052){kind=logo}
I was delighted to be chosen as Labour’s prospective parliamentary candidate (PPC) for Maldon, in my home county of Essex, in July 2013.
Since then I have spent a lot time in Maldon, South Woodham Ferrers and Burnham-on-Crouch, as well as the villages, talking to voters and campaign groups about the issues that matter them, like local NHS services, the economy, and the location of housebuilding schemes.
I grew up in Brentwood in Essex, attended state schools there and in Chelmsford, and my family still live in the county today. After leaving school I worked for a dotcom company in central London for a year before going on to take a First in English Literature at York University and a higher degree at Edinburgh University.
When I finished studying I spent nearly a decade writing for newspapers around the UK. I wrote for my local weekly newspaper aged 14 and then got my first break, at journalism college, when I began to write for the Colchester office of the East Anglian Daily Times.
I then went on to work for regional dailies including the News & Star (Cumbria), the Evening Star (Ipswich) and the Yorkshire Post, mainly covering business and finance, before a spell working for City A.M., a London business freesheet, which is read by around 400,000 people.
During my time as a reporter I covered floods, murder trials and a train crash, as well much of the financial crisis, from bank bail-outs to boardroom coups and mis-selling scandals. I also interviewed a series of FTSE 100 chief executives, economists and politicians and went on assignments in Spain, Italy and Rwanda.
Today I work for Chris Leslie MP, the shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury.
Journalism and politics are not my only interests, however, and I have always had a commitment to social justice. During my twenties I carried out hundreds of hours of voluntary work in the homeless sector, helping out on a soup run at university and, later, in the kitchen at St George’s Crypt hostel in Leeds.
Since summer 2012 I have been a trustee of the Simon Community, a homeless charity, which was set up in 1963 and which raises its own money without support from government.
I am also a member of Essex county cricket club and sit on an Essex County Cricket Board advisory group which helps amateur clubs to improve their finances.
Sign in with your email address
Create an account
Sign in with
Activate your account