Rebecca Coffey Popular Books

Rebecca Coffey Biography & Facts

Thérèse Anne Coffey (born 18 November 1971) is a British politician who served as Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from September to October 2022 under Liz Truss. She has also served as Environment Secretary, Health Secretary and Work and Pensions Secretary. A member of the Conservative Party, Coffey has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Suffolk Coastal since 2010. Coffey served under Prime Minister Theresa May as a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2016 to 2019, before serving under Prime Minister Boris Johnson as a Minister of State at the same department from July to September 2019. In September 2019, after Amber Rudd resigned from Johnson's cabinet, Coffey was appointed to the post of Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. After Johnson resigned in 2022, Coffey supported Liz Truss's bid to become Conservative leader. Following Truss's appointment as Prime Minister in September 2022, Coffey was appointed Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Health and Social Care. After Truss resigned in October 2022, Coffey was appointed by Rishi Sunak as the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. She resigned in November 2023. Early life and career Thérèse Coffey was born on 18 November 1971 in Billinge Hospital in Wigan, Lancashire, to Tom Coffey and Alice George and grew up in Liverpool. She went to St Mary's College, Crosby, and St Edward's College, Liverpool. Coffey then briefly attended Somerville College, Oxford in 1989 to study chemistry. However, in 1991 she was required to withdraw from the college on academic grounds, having obtained poor college examination results twice. Coffey then attended University College London, where she obtained a BSc degree (with upper second class honours) in chemistry in 1993 and later a PhD in chemistry in 1998. After graduating Coffey worked in a number of roles for Mars Incorporated, including as finance director for Mars Drinks UK. She then worked for the BBC as a property finance manager. Political career In the European Parliament elections in June 2004, Coffey stood for election to the European Parliament for South East England. The Conservative Party won 35.2% of the vote, giving it four seats, but Coffey was seventh on the list in this proportional representation system, and was not elected. Coffey stood as the Conservative Party candidate for Wrexham at the 2005 general election, coming third with 20% of the vote. At the 2009 European Parliament elections, Coffey missed out by one place on being elected to the European Parliament for South East England. The Conservative Party won 34.79% of the vote, giving it four seats, and placing her fifth on the party list. Parliamentary career At the 2010 general election, Coffey was elected as MP for Suffolk Coastal with 46.4% of the vote and a majority of 9,128. She is a supporter of the Free Enterprise Group. On 6 July 2011, Coffey defended Rebekah Brooks over the News of the World's involvement in the news media phone hacking scandal. She said a "witch hunt" was developing against Brooks, and that simply to say Brooks was editor of the newspaper at the time was not enough evidence against her. Coffey became a member of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee inquiry into the hacking scandal in 2012. In that committee, she declined to support any motions critical of Rupert and James Murdoch. However, she later joined the majority of her party in voting for exemplary damages to be a default consequence to deter press misbehaviour. Early frontbench career After serving as a member of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee from July 2010 to October 2012, Coffey was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to Michael Fallon, Minister for Business and Energy. Coffey faced criticism in 2011 from some Suffolk residents over her support for the government's proposal to sell off forestry and woodland in public ownership. Protesters argued that "experience shows us that when private landowners come in they close car parks and make access as difficult as possible". The government later dropped the proposal in January 2013. Coffey's decision to write a paper for the Free Enterprise Group recommending pensioners should pay National Insurance contributions on earnings provoked criticism among some older constituents, who claimed that in an already tough economic environment, it was wrong to tax pensioners further. Coffey said that she had "no regrets writing about National Insurance" and that it was "a policy proposal – it is by no means, at this stage, anymore than that". In February 2013, Coffey voted against the legalisation of same-sex marriage, stating: "I shall be voting against the Bill because my perspective on what marriage is really about is different from that of some other Members ... for me it is fundamentally still about family, the bedrock of society." She again voted against same-sex marriage in 2019 when Parliament considered the same question for Northern Ireland. In July 2014, she was appointed an assistant government whip. At the 2015 general election, Coffey was re-elected as MP for Suffolk Coastal with an increased vote share of 51.9% and an increased majority of 18,842. After the election, she was appointed Deputy Leader of the House of Commons on 11 May 2015. In October 2016, Coffey was criticised by the then Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron for accepting hospitality worth £890 from Ladbrokes after supporting the gambling industry in parliament as part of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee; she denied that she had been "influenced in her considerations on matters of related policy by any hospitality received". Coffey voted in favour of a UK referendum on EU membership and consistently voted to proceed with the Brexit process. At the snap 2017 general election, Coffey was again re-elected, with an increased vote share of 58.1% and a decreased majority of 16,012. In the House of Commons she sat on the Environmental Audit Committee from September 2017 to November 2019, ex-officio due to her ministerial role. Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Following the resignation of Amber Rudd in September 2019, Coffey joined the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. She retained her position in Johnson's February 2020 cabinet reshuffle. Coffey was again re-elected at the 2019 general election, with a decreased vote share of 56.5% and an increased majority of 20,533. In June 2020, Coffey responded to Marcus Rashford's campaign for free school meals for children during the COVID-19 pandemic, which included a tweet from Rashford urging the government to remember Britain's poorest families. One of his tweets read, in part: "When you wake up this morning and run your shower, take a second to think about parents who have had their water turned off during lockdown." Coffey's response to his campaign was, "Water cannot be disconnected.... Discover the Rebecca Coffey popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Rebecca Coffey books.