Justine Greening

Justine Greening (born 30 April 1969) is a British former politician who served as Secretary of State for Education from 2016 to 2018 and as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Putney from 2005 to 2019. First elected as a Conservative MP, Greening had the Conservative whip removed on 3 September 2019 and sat as an independent MP after that.

Greening served in the Cameron Government as Economic Secretary to the Treasury and Secretary of State for Transport, prior to being appointed Secretary of State for International Development in September 2012. From 14 July 2016 to 8 January 2018, she served as Secretary of State for Education and Minister for Women and Equalities in the May Government. She resigned as Education Secretary in the January 2018 Cabinet reshuffle. On 3 September 2019, Greening announced she would not be standing as a Conservative at the next general election and subsequently had the whip withdrawn.

Greening was born in Rotherham, where she attended Oakwood Comprehensive School. She studied Business Economics and Accounting at the University of Southampton, graduating with a first class honours degree in 1990. She obtained an Executive MBA from the London Business School in 2000.

Before entering parliament, she trained and qualified as an accountant, working as an accountant/finance manager for, amongst others, PricewaterhouseCoopers, GlaxoSmithKline and Centrica. She contested the constituency of Ealing, Acton and Shepherd's Bush in 2001; Greening finished second with a reduced share of the vote for the Conservatives.

Greening gained the seat of Putney from Labour in the 2005 general election on 5 May 2005. Greening won 15,497 votes (42.4% of the vote) giving her a majority of 1,766 (4.8%). She unseated Tony Colman, who had held the seat for Labour since defeating David Mellor in 1997.

As the first Conservative elected on the evening of the election, her victory was the first real sign that the Conservative Party was to reduce the Labour Government's majority and begin to recover from the landslide defeats of the 1997 and 2001 general elections. Michael Howard, who had visited Putney to give a speech on his first day as Conservative Leader, returned there on the morning after the election to congratulate Putney Conservatives and give the speech in which he announced his intention to step down. Greening was the youngest female Conservative MP in the House of Commons until Chloe Smith was elected to Parliament on 12 October 2009.

Greening was appointed a vice-chair (with responsibility for youth) of the Conservative Party on 15 December 2005, having earlier that year been appointed a member of the Work and Pensions Committee. In July 2007, following a shadow ministerial reshuffle, she was promoted to be a Junior Shadow Minister for The Treasury.

In January 2009, following a further shadow ministerial reshuffle, Greening was promoted to Shadow Minister for London, within the Communities and Local Government Team with responsibility for Local Government Finance. Within this brief, she focused on transport and local community benefits.

In March 2010, she was put in charge of co-ordinating the Conservative campaign for the 2010 general election in London. She held the post of Economic Secretary to the Treasury from 13 May 2010 to 14 October 2011.

In 2018, she established the Social Mobility Pledge upon returning to the backbenches, a new scheme aimed at broadening social mobility and opportunity in Britain. Later that year, she became the first senior Conservative to come out in favour of a new EU referendum, arguing that Parliament was unable to make a decision on Brexit and therefore it had to be put back to the people. In October 2018, in an interview on Good Morning Britain she was asked if she would be interested in launching a leadership bid. Greening said: "Well, things need to change, don't they, and people need to have some hope for the future that Britain can be a country that runs differently and more fairly." Questioned again on whether she would stand for the Conservative leadership if there were a vacancy, Greening said: "I might be prepared to, but I'm more interested in the Conservative party actually showing what it can do for this country."

In early 2019, she co-founded the group Right to Vote alongside Dominic Grieve and Phillip Lee calling for a new referendum. After the formation of The Independent Group, Greening suggested that she could resign the Conservative whip if there was a 'no deal' Brexit. In April 2019, Greening indicated again that she would run for the Tory leadership if a 'centrist' did not run. She also unveiled possible policies such as scrapping tuition fees in favour of a graduate tax and increasing the number of Opportunity Areas.

Transport Secretary

In October 2011, she was appointed Secretary of State for Transport and was sworn of the Privy Council.

Whilst Greening represented the London constituency of Putney she had always campaigned against a third runway at Heathrow Airport. In the run up to the 2012 Cabinet reshuffle, Greening said it would be difficult to serve in a Cabinet which was in favour of a third runway.

In her role as Secretary of State for Transport, Greening oversaw the award of new rail franchises, including the award of the Intercity West Coast franchise to First Group in 2012. In October 2012, Greening announced that the government was cancelling the franchise competition for the InterCity West Coast franchise after discovering significant technical flaws in the way the franchise process was conducted, reversing the decision to award it to FirstGroup.A report by the Transport Select Committee found fault with Greening and revealed that the cost to the taxpayer of the flawed franchise process was at least £40 million.

International Development Secretary

On 4 September 2012, she was replaced by Patrick McLoughlin at the Department for Transport and became Secretary of State for International Development. The move was strongly criticised by the Mayor of London Boris Johnson who believed it was linked to her opposition to a third runway at Heathrow. As Secretary of State for International Development, Greening became a member of the National Security Council.

Education Secretary

Greening was appointed Secretary of State for Education and Minister for Women and Equalities by Theresa May on 14 July 2016, replacing Nicky Morgan in both roles. During her time in these posts, she announced the creation of social mobility 'opportunity areas', and the approval of additional free schools. She has also spoken in favour of creating new grammar schools and retaining university tuition fees.

In the June 2017 general election, after which the Conservatives formed a minority government, she held her Putney constituency with a reduced majority and a loss in vote share of 9.7%. She remained Education Secretary and Minister for Women and Equalities after the election until her resignation from government on 8 January 2018, during a cabinet reshuffle: it was reported that she had rejected the post of Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, interpreted variously as the offer of a "sideways move" or a demotion.

Sitting as an independent

On 3 September 2019, Greening joined 20 other rebel Conservative MPs to vote against the Conservative government of Boris Johnson. The rebel MPs voted with the Opposition against a Conservative motion which subsequently failed. Effectively, they helped block Johnson's "no deal" Brexit plan from proceeding on 31 October. Subsequently, all 21 were advised that they had lost the Conservative "whip", expelling them as Conservative MPs, requiring them to sit as independents. If they decided to run for re-election in a future election, the Party would block their selection as Conservative candidates. Greening, however, said she was not planning to stand for re-election.

In June 2016, Greening revealed on Twitter that she was in a "happy same-sex relationship". Referring to the EU membership referendum, she added: "I campaigned for Stronger In but sometimes you're better off out!" Greening was previously in a relationship with Mark Clarke, a former Conservative parliamentary candidate for Tooting who was expelled from the party for his involvement in a bullying scandal of young members.

• Miss Justine Greening (1969–1987)
• Ms Justine Greening (1987–2005)
• Ms Justine Greening MP (2005–2011)
• The Right Honourable Justine Greening MP (2011–2019)
• The Right Honourable Justine Greening (2019–present)