Member of Parliament for South Thanet

Elected: 2010

Bio:
Laura Sandys MP for South Thanet and Sandwich sits on the Energy and Climate Change Select Committee and the House of Lords Reform Committee. She is Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Epilepsy, Vice Chair of the APPG for Carers and Chair of the APPG for Civic Voice. She is an active member of the backbench Foreign Affairs Support Group.
Professional Experience

Laura founded two companies - the first when she was 19 - and worked in several parts of the world including Turkey, Georgia and Peru. Her company advised energy and utility companies, but she also took on "causes" including campaigning against Saddam's human rights abuses in the 1990s, working on bio-diversity in South America and established a campaign groups to support those with incontinence.

Having sold her last company in 2000, Laura gained an MSt at Cambridge in International Relations, was a Senior Research Associate at the Centre for Defence Studies at Kings College and worked with Military Intelligence during the 2003 Iraq Invasion.

Her areas of political interest include energy and food security, defence, international relations, trade and inward investment.

She opposed the Iraq War, supported the Libyan no-fly zone, is cautious about our relationship with Russia and believes that energy and food price increases are strategic threats facing the UK.

Campaigning for Thanet and Sandwich
Locally, Laura has campaigned on behalf of Thanet's fishermen, English language schools, carers, the small business community and heritage tourism sector.

Following the exit of the pharmaceutical giant, Pfizer, she serves as a member of the Sandwich Taskforce and helped to achieve �40 million through the Regional Growth Fund, an Enterprise Zone, Flood Defences and High Speed Rail for Sandwich.



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