Ms Lyn Brown

Lyn Brown has been the Labour MP for West Ham since 2005. Brown studied English and Religion at Whitelands College (now the University of Roehampton), where she was elected as president of the Student Union. Brown was elected as a councillor to Newham Borough City Council in 1988, marking the start of her political career. She contested the constituency of Wanstead and Woodford in the 1992 general election but was defeated by the incumbent Conservative MP James Arbuthnot. In the 2005 general election, Brown won the safe Labour seat of West Ham. Brown served as an assistant government whip under Gordon Brown, an opposition whip and shadow communities minister under Ed Miliband, and shadow home office and treasury minister under Jeremy Corbyn. In April 2020, she was appointed shadow minister for justice by Kier Starmer. Brown has been outspoken on the need for more financial and social support in light of Covid-19, pointing out that her constituency “had the highest number of people furloughed in the country” and arguing that absences from schools “will create more damage in our communities and more costs for the public purse in the future”.