Caroline Spelman

Caroline Alice Spelman (birth name: Cormack ) ( born May 4, 1958 in Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire) is a British politician of the Conservative Party. From May 2010 to from September 2012 was Minister for the Environment, Food and Rural Areas ( Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs ).

Biography

After visiting the Herts and Essex Grammar School, she graduated at Queen Mary and Westfield College, London University, a degree in European Studies. After six years as a staff member in the Association of European beet sugar industry ( CIBE ) in Paris, she was after her marriage to Mark Spelman, a partner of the consulting firm Accenture, a housewife and mother. In addition, she was the author of a book on biofuels. With her husband she founded in 1989 Spelman, Cormack and Associates, a company for food and biotechnology, and was its director.

While pregnant with her ​​second child, she was a candidate in the general election in 1992 unsuccessfully for a seat in the lower house (House of Commons ) in the constituency of Bassetlaw.

In the general election on 1 May 1997, she was finally chosen as one of 34 new members of the Conservative Party member of the House of Commons and represents in this since the constituency of Meriden.

In June 1998, she became a parliamentary secretary ( Whip ) the conservative faction in the House and was then from June 1999 to September 2001 in her party for Health and Women's Affairs.

In 2003, she was first appointed to the Shadow Cabinet of the Conservative Party and was initially " Shadow Minister for the Environment and for women " and then from 2004 to 2007 for community spirit and local administration.

Subsequently, she was between 2007 and 2009 chairman of the Conservative Party and therefore after Theresa May, only the second woman in this function.

In 2009 she was appointed again in the shadow cabinet of the Conservatives and was there again the shadow minister for communities and local government.

After the electoral victory of the Conservative Party in the general election in 2010, she was appointed on 11 May 2010 by Prime Minister David Cameron for Minister for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in the Cabinet and was thus responsible for agriculture. She had to leave as part of a larger Minister castling 2012, the Cabinet.

Immediately after their appointment you were accused of close relations to the lobby of agricultural enterprises because of her work as director of Spelman, Cormack and Associates.

In July 2010, she was criticized as she described wearing a burqa as empowering and dignified, and as an expression of a feminist standpoint.