Historic number of BME MPs elected to Parliament

The UK made history thrice on May 7th, 2015. First it elected a record number of Black and minority ethnic Members of Parliament , 40 up from 27 last time. Secondly, it recorded the largest intake of new BME MPs -15 - including the first British Chinese MP. And lastly, the House of Commons witnessed the largest intake of new BME female MPs ever, with 10 of the 15 being female. The other two points worth noting were the fact that BME voter turnout was higher in large BME areas such as, Birmingham, Nottingham, Enfield Croydon, Harrow, Ealing and West Ham. And that the BME vote has become more diverse delivering Conservative and Labour MP’s.

The BME MPs elected on 7th May 2015 are as follows:

Diane Abbott, Labour, Hackney North and Stoke Newington
Adam Afriyie, Conservative, Windsor
Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh, SNP, Ochil and South Perthshire
Rushanara Ali, Labour, Bethnal Green and Bow
Dawn Butler, Labour, Brent South
Rehman Chishti, Conservative, Gillingham and Rainham
James Cleverly, Conservative, Braintree
Thangam Debbonaire, Labour, Bristol West
Suella Fernandes, Conservative, Fareham
Nusrat Ghani, Conservative, Wealden
Helen Grant, Conservative, Maidstone and The Weald
Sam Gyimah, Conservative, East Surrey
Sajid Javid, Conservative, Bromsgrove
Ranil Jayawardena, Conservative, North East Hampshire
Mark Hendrick, Labour, Preston
Rupa Huq, Labour, Ealing Central and Acton
Sadiq Khan, Labour, Tooting
Seema Kennedy, Conservative, South Ribble
Kwasi Kwarteng, Conservative, Spelthorne
David Lammy, Labour, Tottenhham
Clive Lewis, Labour, Norwich South
Khalid Mahmood, Labour, Birmingham Perry Barr
Shabana Mahmood, Labour, Birmingham Ladywood
Alan Mak, Conservative, Havant
Seema Malhotra, Labour, Feltham and Heston
Lisa Nandy, Labour, Wigan
Chi Onwurah, Labour, Newcastle upon Tyne Central
Kate Osamor, Labour, Edmonton
Priti Patel, Conservative, Witham
Naz Shah, Labour, Bradford West
Alok Sharma, Conservative, Reading West
Virendra Sharma, Labour, Ealing Southall
Tulip Siddiq, Labour, Hampstead and Kilburn
Rishi Sunak, Conservative, Richmond (Yorks)
Yasmin Qureshi, Labour, Bolton South-East
Chuka Ummuna, Labour, Streatham
Shailesh Vara, Conservative, North West Cambridgeshire
Keith Vaz, Labour, Leicester East
Valerie Vaz, Labour, Walsall South
Nadhim Zahawi, Conservative, Stratford-on-Avon

Operation Black Vote, National Director, Simon Woolley said: “Diversity won on May 7th. Brilliant candidates from both sides of the House were elected and re-elected in record numbers. Further the BME vote made the difference in a number of key seats from which both parties benefited, notably in Ealing. With all political parties recognising that diversity works, both for better and more inclusive politics the challenge now will be to build upon this success at a local, regional and national level.”

Operation Black Vote, Campaigns Director, Ashok Viswanathan said: “For too long Westminster has been akin to a 19th century parlour game played indoors with no reflection of the changing diversity of a 21st century world. These election results with more women and more BME MP's bring Parliament closer to the make-up of the everyday society.”

Operation Black Vote (OBV) campaigned in all of these areas, some using the OBV eXpress voter registration bus, and the hard hitting poster campaign created by Saatchi and Saatchi for registration and turnout.

For the full results visit www.bbc.co.uk/news/election/2015