Rushanara Ali (Bengali: রুশনারা আলী; born 14 March 1975) is a British Labour Partypolitician and Associate Director of the Young Foundation, who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Bethnal Green and Bow since 2010. Previously Shadow Minister for International Development, in the 2013 Labour reshuffle, Ali joined the Shadow Education team. She resigned from the Labour frontbench to abstain on a House of Commons motion permitting military action in Iraq in September 2014. She was re-elected in 2015 doubling her majority to 24,317 and earning 61% share of the vote, which she increased in 2017 to 35,393 and 72% share of the vote.
Ali began her career as a research assistant to Michael Young, working on a project which paved the way for the establishment of Tower Hamlets Summer University, offering independent learning programmes for young people aged 11–25. She also helped to develop "Language Line", a national telephone interpreting service in over 100 languages. Between 1997–1999 she was also parliamentary assistant to Oona King, MP for Bethnal Green and Bow at the time.[2]
Ali worked on human rights issues at the Foreign Office from 2000–2001. Prior to this, she was a research fellow at the Institute of Public Policy Research (IPPR) focussing on anti-discrimination issues from 1999–2002. From 2002–2005, she worked in the community cohesion unit at the Communities Directorate of the Home Office, leading a work programme to mobilise local and national agencies in the aftermath of the 2001 riots in Burnley, Bradford and Oldham, to prevent further conflict and unrest, challenging central Government to provide appropriate support to these areas.[3]
In March 2009, Ali was listed by The Guardian as one of the most powerful Muslim women in Britain.[12]
Parliamentary career
Ali at the au Forum Libération de Grenoble in February 2013
In April 2007, Ali was chosen as the Labour Party's prospective Parliamentary candidate for Bethnal Green and Bow, and in May 2010, was elected as a Member of Parliament with a majority of 11,574 votes.[13] She is the first person of Bangladeshi origin to have been elected to the House of Commons,[14] and along with Shabana Mahmood and Yasmin Qureshi, became one of the United Kingdom's first female Muslim MPs.[15][16]
In October 2013, Ali was appointed Shadow Minister for Education.[18] On 26 September 2014, she resigned from the Labour frontbench Education team to abstain on the Coalition government's House of Commons motion permitting military action against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant in Iraq.[16] In a letter to the leader of the party Ed Miliband, she wrote "I appreciate the sincerity of members of parliament from all sides of the House who today support military action against ISIL. I know that British Muslims stand united in the total condemnation of the murders that ISIL have committed. However, there is a genuine belief in Muslim and non-Muslim communities that military action will only create further bloodshed and further pain for the people of Iraq," Ali also told Miliband that she remained totally committed to his leadership and was looking forward to his becoming the prime minister in next eight months' time. In his return letter to Ali, Miliband praised her as 'someone with great ability and talent'. Regretting her departure from the frontbench team, the Labour leader added that he accepted the resignation with due respect to her decision.[19][20]
In April 2016, British Prime Minister David Cameron appointed Ali as UK trade envoy for Bangladesh,[23][24] as part of cross party trade envoy network.[25][26]
^Rushanara, Ali (July 2006). "One year later". Prospect. Retrieved 18 September 2008. ((cite news)): Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
