Leeds MPs
REEVES, Rachel Jane ( born 1979) Labour. Economist.
Her interest in politics began when she was in secondary school and she joined the Labour Party when she was 16. She graduated from Oxford University after reading Politics, Philosophy and Economics and then acquired an MSc in Economics from the London School of Economics. During her time as an economist, from 2003–2006, she was employed at the Bank of England and the British Embassy in Washington DC. She remained a committed Labour Party member and activist and in 2005 she unsuccessfully contested the safe Conservative seat of Bromley & Chislehurst. A year later she stood in the by-election caused by the death of the sitting MP. She finished fourth with Labour’s vote imploding, and the result being described as a ‘humiliation’ for the party. In 2006 she moved to Leeds to work for HBOS and was adopted as the candidate for Leeds West from an all woman shortlist when John Battle decided to stand down. She was victorious in 2010 and became only the second woman to represent Leeds in the Commons. She became Shadow Pensions Minister that year, and in 2011, Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury. In 2015 she significantly increased her majority by 3,711 votes. She believes in quantitative easing and that the country needs to be creating more highly paid, highly skilled jobs which offer more security and the capacity to save. For further reading see http://www.rachelreevesmp.co.uk.