James Cleverly

Cleverly had previously stood unsuccessfully in a number of elections for the London Borough of Lewisham; including the borough council elections of 2002, a borough council by-election in 2003, for the Lewisham East seat for the UK Parliament in the 2005 general election and as the Conservative candidate for the directly elected mayor of Lewisham in 2006.

In March 2007, Cleverly was selected as the candidate for the Bexley and Bromley constituency of the London Assembly in a very tightly fought selection contest. The London Assembly election was held on 1 May with the count and declaration on the 2 May, where he received 105,162 votes (52.6% of the vote) and a majority of 75,237.

In January 2009, Cleverly was appointed as the Mayor of London's youth ambassador, a newly created role which was seen as being a replacement post for the Deputy Mayor for Young People, a post left vacant after the resignation of Ray Lewis. The creation of the role caused some controversy as it was not filled by a mayoral appointment but by a member of the assembly whose formal role is to scrutinise the Mayor. The decision was defended because of the precedent set by the appointment of Kit Malthouse as Deputy Mayor for Policing.[12]

In February 2010, Cleverly was appointed as the Chairman of the London Waste and Recycling Board, replacing Boris Johnson who had stood down.[13] After the defeat of Brian Coleman at the 2012 London elections he was appointed to the Chair of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority (LFEPA).

In November 2010, Cleverly was re-selected to be the Conservative candidate for Bexley and Bromley in the 2012 GLA elections, going on to win the seat with 88,482 votes (once again 52.6% of the votes) and a majority of 47,768.[14] Following his election to parliament in 2015, he did not defend his seat at the 2016 assembly election.[1]

In January 2015, Cleverly was selected to be the Conservative parliamentary candidate for Braintree in the 7 May general election, after the sitting Conservative MP, Brooks Newmark stood down following controversy over sexting and the sending of obscene images online.[15] His selection came after the initial selection process was quietly suspended by CCHQ, after the local party chose someone not on the approved candidates list and was told to ‘think again’.[16] He was subsequently elected as the constituency's MP.[17] He advocated a Brexit vote in the 2016 EU membership referendum.[18]

In January 2016, the Labour Party unsuccessfully proposed an amendment in Parliament that would have required private landlords to make their homes "fit for human habitation". According to Parliament's register of interests, Cleverly was one of 72 Conservative MPs who voted against the amendment who personally derived an income from renting out property. The Conservative Government had responded to the amendment that they believed homes should be fit for human habitation but did not want to pass the new law that would explicitly require it.[19]

Cleverly was re-elected, with an increased majority (62.8% of the votes cast), as Braintree's MP on 8 June 2017 at the general election.[20] In January 2018 he was appointed as a Deputy Chairman of the Conservative Party[21] before moving to become a junior minister at the Department for Exiting the European Union in April. On 29 May 2019, Cleverly announced that he was standing to replace Theresa May in the Conservative Party leadership election,[22] but announced his withdrawal from the race on 4 June 2019.[23]

Following the appointment of Boris Johnson to the position of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Cleverly was appointed as the Co-Chairman of the Conservative and Unionist Party, serving alongside Ben Elliot.

During the 2020 British cabinet reshuffle, Cleverly was appointed as the Minister of State for the Middle East and North Africa, succeeding Dr Andrew Murrison. He said the move to the Foreign Office was "exciting beyond belief and gives me a chance to work in an area of government I'm really passionate about".[24]