Seema Malhotra MP Biography
Seema Malhotra is a British Labour and Co-operative Party politician. She has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Feltham and Heston since a by-election was held following the death of Alan Keen in 2011.
Seema Malhotra MP was born on 7 August 1972 to Sushil Kumar Malhotra (1941-2014), a shop owner, formerly a financial adviser and Usha, an engineer. She was one of five children.
She was educated at schools in the London Borough of Hounslow, studied politics and philosophy at the University of Warwick and took a postgraduate degree in business and information studies at Aston University.
Seema Malhotra was elected Labour and Co-Operative Member of Parliament for Feltham and Heston in December 2011, and re-elected with an enhanced majority in 2015. She is a member of the influential Select Committee on Exiting the European Union. She is Co-chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Assistive Technology.
Seema recently served as Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury and continues to keep an interest in economic affairs, productivity, how we grow and share prosperity and youth education achievement. From 2014-2015, she served as Shadow Home Office Minister for Preventing Violence against Women and Girls where she led on aspects of the Serious Crime Bill for Labour. She has also been an Opposition Whip and Parliamentary Private Secretary to Rt Hon Yvette Cooper MP, who is now the Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee.
Prior to entering Parliament, Seema was a freelance business and public service adviser working with the video game and film industries. She has over ten years’ experience with leading firms Accenture and PriceWaterhouseCoopers working in strategy and IT systems development. Seema has worked across Whitehall with justice agencies and creative industries. She is the founder and President of the Fabian Women’s Network. Seema is on the Fabian Society Executive and a former Chair of the Fabian Society.
Seema Malhotra MP Age
Seema Malhotra MP was born on 7 August 1972 to Sushil Kumar Malhotra (1941-2014), a shop owner, formerly a financial adviser and Usha, an engineer.
Seema Malhotra MP
Seema Malhotra Husband
Malhotra is married to management consultant and financier Sushil Kumar Saluja, who is Accenture’s Senior Managing Director for Financial Services in Europe, Africa, Middle East, and Latin America, and serves on the board of TheCityUK which is an industry body that promotes financial services in the UK. They live in Chelsea, London.
Seema Malhotra MP responds to Third Runway expansion at Heathrow
The Transport Secretary, Chris Grayling MP, announced that the Government will push for a third runway at Heathrow Airport. Seema Malhotra MP’s statement on the Government’s Heathrow National Policy Statement:
“A significant proportion of local residents will welcome the news that the Government has taken the next step in Heathrow expansion. Past polling has shown a majority of residents in Feltham and Heston supporting the principle of expansion, with the positive impact this will have on jobs and opportunities for SMEs in the local economy. However, many are rightly concerned about the negative environmental impacts associated with expansion, particularly noise, respite, air pollution and night flights. The Transport Select Committee produced an excellent report scrutinising the Government’s draft National Policy Statement and it is disappointing that despite claiming to accept 24 out of the Committee’s 25 recommendation the final NPS contains very little of the detail that the Committee requested.
“The absence of flight path information is a especially concerning as many communities will experience aircraft noise for the first time with a third runway and I have raised this issue in Parliament. The NPS also fails to address the proposed routes and costs of the required surface access improvements. It gives no mention of the regeneration benefits that could be delivered by a new rail line proposed by Hounslow Council accessing the south of the airport via Feltham. The NPS also does not include any condition on Heathrow’s promise of no increase in airport-related traffic on the local road network. I am also concerned that the NPS has not extended the proposed night flight from 6.5 hours to 7 hours as recommended by the Transport Select Committee. I will be consulting with residents on these issues over the coming weeks and would encourage local residents to get in touch.”
Seema Malhotra MP Interview
Source: www.newstatesman.com
What made you go into politics?
Seema Malhotra MP: I got involved with a lot of community campaigns and some political campaigns while still at school. So much about being in pressure groups is about influencing decision makers – and it made me realise that as well as influencing, sometimes its also important to be part of the decision making process. That got me interested in how politics works. I met someone in the Labour Party who encouraged me to join and I haven’t looked back since.
What job did you do before you became an MP?
Seema Malhotra MP: I worked for Accenture and PwC and then as an independent management consultant (which isn’t a career that is well understood!). I have worked with a range of Government departments and with industry (most recently film and games industries) on projects mostly around how you improve business and public services. It’s been a career with a lot of variety. I spent two years as a systems analyst, then worked as part of the set up team for a regional development agency, and even project managed the launch of Playstation 2 in the UK. My four years in the Home Affairs/Justice sector were probably the most lifechanging experiences. I always wanted a career outside politics and am lucky to have had one that taught me so much.
Which law would you scrap?
Seema Malhotra MP: Not surprisingly I wish I could turn the clock back on the Health and Social Care Bill. We’ve had unnecessary structural change that I believe has weakened the NHS and there is much pain still to come.
And if you could pass one law, what would it be?
Seema Malhotra MP: I’d make it illegal to fraudulently use someone’s address as your own. Apparently it is not against the law – and it has happened to a few of my constituents. They have had police turn up in the early hours with warrants for the arrest of people they have never heard of. Any form of identity theft is a real invasion of people’s rights and privacy.
Do politics and religion mix?
Seema Malhotra MP: No, at least not for very long. And not very well.
Who is your favourite prime minister from history, and why?
Seema Malhotra MP: I’m not sure I’d have one. I’d choose Clem Attlee for his courage setting up our post-war welfare state, and Harold Wilson for his wisdom on social reform and abolition of the death penalty. I also feel very fortunate to have experienced the Labour victory in 1997 – it’s easy to forget quite how much we changed under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.
Name three dream dinner-party guests.
Seema Malhotra MP: Ally McBeal (ok she’s fictitional but she’s a big part of my life), Madam Alaska – a refugee from the Russian Revolution who lived in Feltham around 100 years ago. She trained circus animals and used to walk up Feltham High Street with a lion. And finally, Maud Pember Reeves. In 1908 she founded the first Fabian Women’s Group – the forerunner of the Fabian Women’s Network I founded in 2005.
Which politician from a different party do you most admire?
Seema Malhotra MP: I may not always agree with her, but right now I would say Caroline Lucas. A quite remarkable politician with absolute conviction.
What’s your karaoke song of choice?
Seema Malhotra MP: Gloria Gaynor’s “I will Survive”. Such a classic. Perfect for a girl’s night out.
What’s the last film you saw?
Seema Malhotra MP: It was actually The Iron Lady a few weeks after I got elected. Her election scenes and first moments in the House felt eerily familiar.
What’s the last work of fiction you read?
Seema Malhotra MP: David Lammy’s Out of the Ashes is my book of the month.
Newsnight or Question Time?
Seema Malhotra MP: Newsnight.
Humphrys or Paxman?
Seema Malhotra MP: Kirsty Wark.
Who is your favourite blogger?
Seema Malhotra MP: Sunny Hundal. He lives and breathes the blog.
Who is your favourite newspaper columnist?
Seema Malhotra MP: I’ll always stop and read what Mary Riddell has written. Quite a unique blend of head and heart.
If you could change one thing about your job, what would it be?
Seema Malhotra MP: I’d change nothing, but an extra day in the week would be great!
What’s the funniest or saddest thing you’ve ever heard at a surgery?
Seema Malhotra MP: My first house visit – a woman left by her husband to bring up her three children with all of them living in two rooms rented in-house from a private landlord. She had never paid the rent or had sight of the rental agreement before he left. She had to deal with the emotion of him deserting her, find a job and look after the children. Now they are older they rotate between the bed and sofa. She doesn’t have the money to move out. So often women are left picking up the pieces when families break down.
What was your worst doorstep campaigning moment?
Seema Malhotra MP: I’m afraid I love every doorstep visit.
Who is the most important person in your life, and why?
Seema Malhotra MP: There’s competition for that! My husband of course – I’m in awe of his intelligence and he’s incredibly supportive. But my parents have always backed me – through all the times I stood in non-winnable local elections – and I doubt I’d have been here without them.
Do you think you will ever be prime minister – and if not, why not?
Seema Malhotra MP: Not the right question to ask an MP after four months – I’m still working out how to be a backbencher!