Brendan Clarke-Smith

Clarke-Smith was born in Clifton, Nottingham in 1980. He grew up on a council estate in Nottingham and was the first member of his family to go to university, studying politics at Nottingham Trent University and gaining a PGCE in religious education. He became a teacher and later head of an International School in Romania.[4][5] At the time of his election to Parliament, he lived in Edwinstowe with his Romanian wife, who is a doctor at Bassetlaw Hospital. They have a son.[6][3]

In January 2021 Clarke-Smith was given a COVID-19 vaccination after volunteering at a hospital and being offered a leftover jab.[7]

Clarke-Smith contested the EU elections in 2014 and 2019 in the East Midlands region. In May 2019, Clarke-Smith overturned a Labour majority in Boughton and Walesby to be elected as a councillor on Newark & Sherwood District Council.[8]

He was selected as the Conservative party candidate for Bassetlaw in the December 2019 elections when the sitting MP John Mann stood down. He overturned a Labour majority with the biggest swing in the election, from a 4,852 Labour majority to a 14,013 Conservative majority.[9] This is the first time Bassetlaw has been represented by a party other than Labour since Malcolm MacDonald won the seat in 1929.[10] As one of the Conservative MPs who overturned Labour's so-called 'Red Wall' in the North and Midlands in the 2019 election, Clarke-Smith has varyingly been described by the press as part of "the Blue Collar Caucus"[11] and a "Red Wall Tory MP".[12]

Clarke-Smith said after his election as an MP that he has three main priorities:

• "Getting Brexit done"
• Improving Bassetlaw Hospital
• Attracting more money for Retford and Worksop town centres.[13]

In March 2020 Clarke-Smith was appointed to the International Development Committee.[14]

Clarke-Smith campaigned to leave the EU in the 2016 EU referendum and was a member of the Bassetlaw Vote Leave campaign, which secured a 67.8% leave vote.[15] In May 2019 he commented that leaving the EU offered the chance to create more opportunities for young people globally, saying "We're not leaving Europe, we're leaving the EU. It's not just about Europe, we want to get out and be more in the world. Britain has a very important place in the world."[16]

In December 2019, Clarke-Smith was reported to be one of the new members of the eurosceptic European Research Group.[17]

Clarke-Smith has accused food banks of being "political weapons", saying it is "simply not true" that "people can’t afford to buy food on a regular basis" and "[i]f you keep saying to people that you’re going to give stuff away, then you’re going to have an increase".[18]

In October 2020, Clarke-Smith opposed a Labour motion to offer free school meals during holidays until Easter 2021, stating that "absent parents [should] take some responsibility for their children." He said: "I do not believe in nationalising children. Instead, we need to get back to the idea of taking responsibility. This means less celebrity virtue signalling on Twitter by proxy and more action to tackle the real causes of child poverty."[19]

Following an interim report on the connections between colonialism and properties now in the care of the National Trust, including links with historic slavery, Clarke-Smith was among the signatories of a letter to The Telegraph from the "Common Sense Group" of Conservative Parliamentarians. The letter accused the National Trust of being "coloured by cultural Marxist dogma, colloquially known as the 'woke agenda'".[20]

• Profile at Parliament of the United Kingdom
• Contributions in Parliament at Hansard
• Voting record at Public Whip
• Record in Parliament at TheyWorkForYou