Mary Foy is the Labour MP for the City of Durham, having first been elected to Parliament in 2019 with a majority of 5,025 over the Conservative Party.
The City of Durham is a safe Labour seat having been held by the party consistently since the 1930s. Containing the centre of Durham and Durham university, the constituency also includes some former mining communities and rural areas outside of the city itself.
Born in 1968, Mary Foy worked as a Community Development Worker for Durham City Community Voluntary Service. She also worked as an assistant to the former Jarrow MP, Stephen Hepburn, before being elected to Parliament in her own right.
Foy was first elected to Gateshead Borough Council in 2006.
She is considered to be on the left of the Labour Party and is a member of the Socialist Campaign Group of MPs.
She supported Rebecca Long Bailey in the 2020 Labour leadership election. She has previously sat on the Labour Party’s national policy forum.
In 2022, Foy came to public attention after the police announced they were to reopen their investigation into an alleged event in her constituency office during the second coronavirus lockdown. The so called ‘beergate bhuna’ event was attended by the labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer, and his deputy Angela Rayner.
Foy is married with three children, including a daughter with cerebral palsy. Foy is the co Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Cerebral Palsy.
She is also a member of the All Party Parliamentary Groups on Coalfield Communities and Housing in the North.
Email – mary.foy.mp@parliament.uk
Website – www.maryfoy.org.uk
