Who is Lisa Nandy? The Wigan MP could be a cabinet member in a Sir Keir Starmer government

When Lisa Nandy became shadow energy and climate change secretary in 2015, she may have hoped to follow in the footsteps of former Labor leader Ed Miliband.

Miliband was in the role before making the jump to opposition leader in 2010, and Nandy also looked set for a future at the top.

But now, in 2024, Miliband finds himself back in that post, and Nandy is now shadow secretary for international development – ​​a similar position.

Those black and whites might suggest a lack of progress, but it’s actually been a decade well spent for the Labor MP for Wigan.

Nandy is now set to be in the cabinet if Labor lives up to poll predictions and returns to number 10 for the first time in 14 years.

And while her experience could make her a key player in Sir Keir Starmer’s top team, she should not be ruled out for the top job in the future.

Who is Lisa Nandy?

The 44-year-old has been Labor MP for Wigan since 2010, having previously been a caseworker and charity worker.

She was introduced as a younger player on the left of the party and her work as an MP saw her help keep the city’s football team afloat. She also set up the Center for Towns think tank and called for Labour’s headquarters to move out of London.

“I understand we have a chance to win back the trust of the people of Wigan, Workington and Wrexham,” she told the Telegraph in 2020.

“Without what were once our Labor hearts, we will never win power in Westminster and help build the country we know we can be.”

The daughter of the respected British-Indian academic Dipak Nandy, her heritage made her one of the few British-Asian MPs in the election. She is a mother of one and married to Andy Collis, a public relations consultant.

She joked that compared to her father’s Marxist views, she is seen in her family as relatively “right-wing”.

Her book All In: How We Build a Country That Works was published in 2022 and advocated the empowerment of local communities.

What roles did Lisa Nandy play?

Under Ed Miliband, Nandy had been shadow minister for children and shadow secretary for civil society. Under Jeremy Corbyn, she became shadow energy secretary.

However, she was not an ardent supporter of Corbyn, stepping down from her post and later saying it was “undoubtedly true” that he was to blame for the 2019 election defeat.

She then became party leader in 2020 after Corbyn resigned and said Labor needed to do things differently.

“We need a different kind of leadership to help root us back into every community in Britain, to turn us back into a real movement and a real force, led from the ground up, so that we can win back people’s trust she said.

Her campaign won the support of the GMB Union and the Jewish Labor Movement, but came third with 16% of the vote, ahead of Rebecca Long Bailey and winner Starmer.

What is Lisa Nandy’s current role?

Under Starmer, Nandy was appointed shadow foreign secretary and later shadow level secretary. But in a reshuffle in September 2023, she was appointed shadow minister of the international development cabinet, which was widely seen as a demotion.

At the time, Unherd suggested that Sir Keir was looking to move his allies closer and potential rivals further away.

An ed op said: “Once the government’s (potential Starmer) honeymoon is over, he will face the same backroom politics that others have. A dispossessed Nandy could be a key figure in that.”

However, Nandy has toed the party line in recent weeks and campaigned for deputy leader Angela Rayner over the saga surrounding her council property.

She is also chair of the Labor Friends of Palestine and the Middle East – a role that has made her well-placed to lobby for UN aid on behalf of Gazans and supported David Lammy in calling for a ceasefire.