Curran was born in Glasgow, the daughter of Irish parents James Curran and Rose McConnellogue.[2][3] She was educated at Our Lady and St Francis School in Glasgow.
In 1999 Curran was elected to the new Scottish Parliament, and was promoted to a junior minister when Henry McLeish became First Minister and later became a member of the Scottish Executive.[4] She served as convenor of the Social Inclusion committee, then was promoted to Deputy Minister for Social Justice. She then rose to become minister in that portfolio, which later changed to Minister for Communities, introducing the Homelessness (Scotland) Bill[5] in September 2002. She held the position of Minister for Parliamentary Business from 2004 until 2007.
She was re-elected comfortably in 2003 and again in 2007. Given Scottish Labour's losses in that later election, she was widely viewed as a popular potential successor to Jack McConnell as its leader, but decided not to stand against Wendy Alexander. Curran pledged her support to Iain Gray who was standing against Cathy Jamieson and Andy Kerr. Iain Gray was voted Scottish Labour Party Leader and appointed Curran to manage the party's 2011 election manifesto.[6] She stood down as MSP for Glasgow Baillieston at the 2011 Scottish election.
On 30 June 2008, David Marshall, MP for Glasgow East, resigned from the House of Commons on grounds of ill health, triggering a by-election.[7] The Labour candidate for the by-election was to have been announced on 4 July,[8] though the announcement was postponed when the likely choice, local councillor George Ryan, chose to withdraw from the nomination process.[9] On 5 July, Curran placed herself forward for nomination on the Labour Party's shortlist and was confirmed as their candidate on 7 July.[10][11] The by-election took place on 24 July 2008 and Curran was defeated by John Mason of the Scottish National Party by 365 votes.[12] The swing from Labour was 22.54%.
At the 2015 general election, she lost her seat to Natalie McGarry of the Scottish National Party. This was a landslide defeat for Scottish Labour; who lost forty of the forty-one seats they were defending, and were reduced to a single MP at Westminster, with the SNP elected in 56 of Scotland's 59 seats. With many veteran Labour politicians losing their seats, including: then-Shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander and then-Scottish Labour Party Leader, Jim Murphy. Presenting speeches following their constituency's declaration, Curran declined to speak following the announcement of her own defeat.
Views on Alex Salmond
Curran was known to have a particularly difficult relationship with SNP leader Alex Salmond. In 2012, Curran accused Salmond and his government of having a "culture of casual dishonesty",[16] and suggested his "blokeish attitude" made him a liability among women in Scotland during the Scottish independence referendum campaign.[17] In November 2011, she told Holyrood magazine[18] that were Salmond to be killed by being run over by a bus, she would have no interest in finding out who the driver was.[19] In April 2014, she dismissed Salmond's appeal to female voters, saying "Women will see through his cynical attempts to win them over" and described a speech he made as "drivel".[20] Speaking about a work programme whilst in Dundee, Curran stated "Every time I'm in Dundee people have raised their disappointment with the former First Minister over his promise. Renewable energy is a sector Dundee badly needs and the city has been let down badly by his retreat from promise. I think Alex Salmond should apologise to the people of Dundee". These comments related to the fact that only 15% of Work Programme participants had proceeded to find a job.[21]
Personal life
She and her husband Robert "Rab" Murray live in Glasgow with their two sons. Curran listed her recreations in Who's Who as "reading, theatre, American politics" and "spending time with my sons".[3]
