Liam Byrne was first elected as the Labour Party MP for Birmingham Hodge Hill in a 2004 by-election, being reelected with a majority of 28,655 in 2019.
Birmingham Hodge Hill covers Hodge Hill in the east of Birmingham. It includes both the largely Asian inner city area of Washwood Heath, and the area of Shard End on the edge of the city. It is one of the most deprived seats in the West Midlands, and a Labour stronghold with the party winning almost four out of five votes here in 2019.
He currently serves as chair of the House of Commons business and trade select committee.
Byrne stood unsuccessfully as the Labour candidate in the 2021 West Midlands mayoral election.
He also served as the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office before being promoted to become chief secretary of the Treasury in Gordon Brown’s government.
He famously left a note for the incoming Conservative government in 2010 saying, ‘I am afraid there is no money’.
Rishi Sunak asked if he ever ‘lies awake at night’ worrying about UK inequality
In April 2022, Mr Byrne was suspended from the House of Commons for two sitting days, having been found to have committed serious breaches of ‘Parliament’s Bullying and Harassment Policy in relation to a former parliamentary assistant. In a statement, Mr Byrne has accepted that he “did not resolve the dispute correctly with a proper disciplinary process”, and that he failed to fulfil his obligations as an employer.
Before entering Parliament, Liam Byrne, was a technology entrepreneur, co-founding the European-wide eCommerce company, eGS Group. Beginning on a kitchen table, he spent four years building the business into what became a successful public sector e-procurement exchange in Europe. Previously, he worked for merchant bankers, NM Rothschild and multi-national consulting firm, Accenture.
Born in Warrington in 1970, Byrne started working life as a part-time worker at McDonalds. He was educated at Manchester University, where he served on the National Council of the National Union of Students.
He later studied for an MBA at the prestigious Harvard Business School in America, where he was a Fulbright Scholar .
Byrne joined the Labour Party when he was 15 and today lives in Birmingham with his wife Sarah and three children. He is a member of Unite, the Fabian Society and the Christian Socialist Movement.
Byrne nominated Jess Phillips in the 2020 Labour leadership election.
He has written a number of books including on entrepreneurialism and counter extremism.
Email: byrnel@parliament.uk
Personal Website: http://www.liambyrne.co.uk/
Twitter: @LiamByrneMP
