Andrew Mitchell

For other people named Andrew Mitchell, see Andrew Mitchell (disambiguation).

The Right Honourable Andrew Mitchell MP
Mitchell during the 2009 Conservative Party Conference.
Secretary of State for International Development
Incumbent
Assumed office 12 May 2010
Prime Minister	David Cameron
Preceded by	Douglas Alexander
Shadow Secretary of State for International Development
In office 7 May 2005 – 11 May 2010
Leader	Michael Howard David Cameron
Preceded by	Alan Duncan
Succeeded by	Douglas Alexander
Member of Parliament for Sutton Coldfield
Incumbent
Assumed office 7 June 2001
Preceded by	Norman Fowler
Majority	17,005 (33.6%)
Member of Parliament for Gedling
In office 11 June 1987 – 1 May 1997
Preceded by	Philip Holland
Succeeded by	Vernon Coaker
Personal details
Born	(1956-03-23) 23 March 1956 Hampstead, London, England
Political party	Conservative
Alma mater	Jesus College, Cambridge
Website	www.andrew-mitchell-mp.co.uk

Andrew John Bower Mitchell (born 23 March 1956) is a British Conservative Party politician and the Member of Parliament (MP) for Sutton Coldfield. He was appointed as Secretary of State for International Development on 12 May 2010, and as a Privy Counsellor on 13 May 2010.

Early life

Andrew Mitchell was born in Hampstead in north London, and is the son of David Mitchell, a former Conservative MP and junior Government minister.

Education

Mitchell was educated at Rugby School. After a short-service commission in the Royal Tank Regiment, he went up to Jesus College, Cambridge, where he studied History. He was Chairman of the Cambridge University Conservative Association in Michaelmas 1977 and the President of the Cambridge Union in 1978.

Early career

Mitchell served as a United Nations peacekeeper in Cyprus during the 1970s, and went on to work and travel extensively in Africa and Asia. He served in the Royal Tank Regiment of the British Army before joining Lazard, one of the world's largest investment banks, where he worked with British companies seeking large-scale overseas contracts. He is a Trustee of the E.M. Radiation Research Trust, which conducts research into radiation emissions, from sites such as mobile phone masts. He was also a Senior Strategy Advisor for Accenture, the management consultancy and technology outsourcing company.

Political career

Mitchell was the only Conservative member of Islington Health Authority (IHA) in north London during the 1980s, and in that capacity, he called among other measures for the IHA to make greater use of competitive tendering in the allocation of service contracts.

Mitchell entered Parliament at 31 years old, as the MP for Gedling, in Nottinghamshire, between 1987 and 1997. In 1988, under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, he became PPS to William Waldegrave, who was Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. In 1990, he became PPS to John Wakeham, who was Secretary of State for Energy. In 1992, under John Major, he became Vice-Chairman of the Conservative Party, and in the same year was appointed as an Assistant Government Whip. In 1993, he became a Government Whip. In 1995, he became Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Social Security, a position he held until 1997.

Mitchell lost his Commons seat in Tony Blair's Labour 'landslide' election of 1997, but in 2001, returned to Parliament as the MP for Sutton Coldfield, in Birmingham. He held no shadow ministerial or organisational position under the leadership of Iain Duncan Smith, but in 2003, in the first month of the new leadership of Michael Howard, he became Shadow Minister of State for Economic Affairs, and 2004, the Shadow Minister of State for Home Affairs, in which his primary brief was police matters. In May 2005, he was appointed to the Shadow Cabinet as Shadow Secretary of State for International Development. After Howard's decision to stand down as leader following the 2005 General Election defeat, Mitchell ran the unsuccessful leadership campaign of David Davis, but retained his Shadow Cabinet position under the newly-elected Conservative leader, David Cameron. He was re-elected at the May 2010 general election, and in the same month became the new Secretary of State for International Development at the Department for International Development (DfID).

Keep Justice Local campaign

In 2002, Mitchell successfully led the Keep Justice Local campaign across his constituency of Sutton Coldfield to safeguard the 50-year-old Courthouse (Magistrates' Court) from imminent closure. He presented a petition signed by over 5,500 constituents, protesting at plans to transfer the Courthouse's work to Birmingham.

However, once in government Mitchell changed his views on the closure of the courthouse after a decision was taken to close it December 2010. Mitchell quoted as saying: "We must now ensure that there's a widespread local discussion about the future of the site and the building. I know that our councillors are already looking at how best we can do this".

Voting record

In 1994, as MP for Gedling, Mitchell voted in the House of Commons for the restoration of the death penalty, which measure was defeated 383–186. Between 2001 and 2010, as MP for Sutton Coldfield, his House of Commons voting record shows that he voted for: limiting climate change, Civil Partnerships for gay couples, greater autonomy for schools, a UK Referendum on the EU Lisbon Treaty, the replacement of Trident, the invasion of Iraq and the subsequent Iraq investigation, and limiting pollution from civil aviation. During the same period, he voted against: ID cards, the closure of Post Offices, both 42 days' and 90 days' detention without charge or trial, the DNA database, closer EU integration, the relaxation of gambling laws, Section 28 (although in 1988 he had voted in favour), employment discrimination against gay people, the legalisation of recreational drugs, a fully elected House of Lords and a ban on fox hunting. He was ranked by the Liberal Democrat Voice (connected to, but not part of, the Liberal Democrat Party) as one of the least authoritarian members of Parliament, scoring 3 out of 100 points for his votes between 2005 - 2010., with a joint ranking of 542 out of 619.

Work as a Member of Parliament

Mitchell has campaigned on a wide range of local issues, from the safety of mobile phone masts to the administration of justice, and has particularly focussed on local development where it appears to adversely affect his constituents. He deals with a wide range of issues for constituents, often dealing directly with government departments, agencies and other organisations on their behalf, and holds regular Advice Sessions for them. He also regularly visits local schools, businesses and voluntary organisations across Sutton Coldfield. He successfully brought about the restoration of Sutton Coldfield Civic Service and introduced the Sutton Coldfield Inter-Schools Debating Competition. He receives over 5,000 letters per year from constituents, and actively supports a number of local charities including Breastfriends, Norman Laud Association, the Sutton Coldfield Branch of the RNLI, Parkinson’s Disease Society, Sutton Coldfield Sea Cadets, Greenacres, and Sutton Coldfield Guiding.

2005 Leadership Contest

Mitchell was the Campaign Manager for David Davis in the 2005 Conservative leadership contest. Davis started the campaign as the widely acknowledged front runner, but delivered a speech to that year's Conservative Party Conference which was described as "uninspiring" by his party supporters and the media. However, referring to a Conference speech by the party's former leader, Mitchell said: "William Hague made a great speech which many people will judge to be better than all the other leadership candidates put together. What that tells you is that being absolutely brilliant at being able to make a speech at conference is not the be-all-and-end-all of leadership. There are other things as well."

Although Davis attracted a sizeable vote of party members in the contest, he was defeated by his younger challenger, David Cameron. Despite Davis's defeat, however, Mitchell retained his position in Cameron's new Shadow Cabinet.

Mitchell reaction to Davis resignation

In June 2008, David Davis took a decision to resign both his position as Shadow Home Secretary and his constituency seat, and to immediately stand for re-election, in protest at the Labour Government's proposal to extend detention without trial for terrorist suspects to 42 days. Andrew Mitchell was reported by the media to have met Davis on the House of Commons terrace and was seen to have "looked horrified" when Davis told him of his decision, and to have vigorously argued with him about it. His friends apparently said later that he was "incandescent" at not having been consulted beforehand. Davis allegedly replied: "It's too late — I've already done it", to which Mitchell allegedly responded: "You're nuts".

Direct involvement with developing world

Whilst still in Opposition, Mitchell visited countries throughout the developing world to establish in detail how aid could be most effectively and fairly delivered. He visited a number of countries in Africa and Asia containing some of the worst poverty in the world, such as Sierra Leone, Ghana, Ethiopia, Chad, Eritrea, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Kenya, Thailand, Cambodia and Burma (The Republic of the Union of Myanmar). In many of these places, he created video reports detailing local conditions and some of the NGO projects aimed at ameliorating them. Whilst in Burma, Mitchell challenged its Government by raising evidence of systematic human rights abuses in the country, and its continued imprisonment of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. He also emphasised the need to provide rapid and substantial aid to the victims of the 2010 Haiti earthquake.

Project Umubano

Mitchell led large groups of Conservative volunteers from a wide range of professions, including doctors, teachers, lawyers and entrepreneurs, in social development projects in Rwanda for three consecutive summers, from 2007 to 2009, as part of Project Umubano, and kept a detailed diary of their activities and experiences. The volunteers focussed on five areas: health, education, justice, the private sector, and a community centre construction project. In 2008, Mitchell himself taught English to over a thousand Rwandan primary school teachers.

BBC Gaza Appeal

Mitchell expressed support for the idea of a televised appeal for Gaza on the BBC in 2009, a subject which had aroused much controversy on both sides of the argument. He said that whilst the matter was ultimately for the BBC to decide, "We believe that they should allow the broadcast to proceed so that the British public, who have proved themselves so generous during recent emergencies in the Congo and Burma, can make their own judgment on the validity of the appeal".

Praise from news presenter Jon Snow

On 1 July 2010, at the end of the Global Poverty Debate in the House of Commons, according to both the verbatim transcript of www.parliament.uk, and the full video recording of the debate at BBC Democracy Live, the Minister of State for International Development, Alan Duncan, quoted the Channel 4 news presenter and journalist Jon Snow as having said the previous day that: "Andrew Mitchell is unquestionably the best prepared Secretary of State — nobody has waited longer in the wings and everyone in the sector knows of his commitment to the sector".

Emphasis on aid transparency and contributions 'guarantee'

As Secretary of State for International Development, Mitchell has repeatedly asserted the need for transparency in aid donations to other countries, with contributions fully accounted for and published, and intends Britain to lead the world in this transparency. He has made clear that value for money in aid donations are of critical importance and has provided a guarantee that British legislation will be amended to ensure that Britain's aid contributions will be maintained at 0.7% of UK GNI (Gross National Income) by 2013. He has also asked former international envoy and Liberal Democrat leader Paddy Ashdown to conduct a review of the UK's response to international humanitarian disasters, such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, to see whether lessons can be learned from them.

Prize Winner of Westminster Dog of the Year Award

In 2009, Andrew Mitchell won the top prize among Parliamentarians for the Westminster Dog of the Year Award, for his dog Molly. Judges said that Molly, a seven-year old Welsh Springer Spaniel, had an "excellent condition and temperament", that she "stood out particularly because she is the ‘glue’ of her family“, and that Mitchell was "an owner who shows commitment to responsible dog ownership".

2009 expenses claims

According to The Daily Telegraph newspaper, which first reported the unredacted expenses claims of Members of Parliament, the vast majority of claims made by Mitchell were for office expenses, but there was criticism of him among some of the British media, which reported that he had made a number of small claims for items such as a 'stick of glue' (reportedly costing 13 pence), and other items, that they implied should have been paid from his own pocket. However, these items appear to have been for official Parliamentary use, and were accepted by the House of Commons Fees Office as legitimate expenses incurred as a result of his Parliamentary work. In contrast to the expenses claims made by a number of other MPs, there were no allegations in The Daily Telegraph or other newspapers that Mitchell had at any time made excessively large claims, had sought to benefit personally from them, or that there had been any impropriety in any of his claims.

Allegations of lobbying on behalf of donors

Articles in the Sunday Times and the Guardian newspapers of 31 October 2010 report that Mitchell pressured the Foreign Office and colleagues to lobby Ghana (successfully) for the lifting of a ban on cocoa company Armajaro, which had been a repeated donor to Mitchell's parliamentary office and also a donor to the Conservative Party. Ghana had imposed the ban as the company was believed by the Ghanaian government to have been smuggling cocoa out of Ghana.

Personal life

Mitchell is married to a G.P. and has two children, and lives in his constituency of Sutton Coldfield and in Islington in north London. His wealth is estimated at £2m.

See also

• Cameron Ministry

External links

• Andrew Mitchell official constituency website
• Contributions in Parliament at Hansard 1803–2005
• Voting record at Public Whip
• Record in Parliament at TheyWorkForYou
• Profile: Andrew Mitchell BBC News, 10 February 2005
• Pan-African Free Trade Agreement: Helping Africa through Free Trade – Andrew Mitchell talks at the Cato Institute