Voters elect the most diverse parliament ever

There will be a record 51 ethnic minority MPs in the new House of Commons, telling a ‘positive story about integration’

A record number of ethnic minority MPs will take up seats in the new House of Commons following yesterday’s general election. Some 51 non-white parliamentarians were elected, compared to 41 in the last parliament.

Most, 32, of the new ethnic minority MPs will sit on the Labour benches. Labour has 261 MPs in total. Meanwhile, 19 are Conservatives, from a total of 315 Tory MPs.

The figures were calculated this morning by independent thinktank British Future, which describes itself as seeking to address ‘people’s hopes and fears about identity and integration, migration and opportunity’.

The 2017 parliament will be the most diverse ever. Thirty years on, that tells a positive story about integration

British Future director Sunder Katwala said: “The 2017 parliament will be the most diverse ever, with 10 new ethnic minority MPs taking the total of non-white parliamentarians to 51. Thirty years on, that tells a positive story about integration since the breakthrough election of 1987.”

The Liberal Democrats will have one ethnic minority MP out of a total of 12. That MP is Layla Moran (pictured) in Oxford West and Abingdon, who overturned a Conservative majority of nearly 10,000 to take the seat. A physics teacher, she is mixed race: her mother is a Christian Palestinian from Jerusalem, making her among the first British MPs with Arab roots.

The full list of ethnic minority MPs is:

Labour

Tulip Siddiq, Rupa Huq, Dawn Butler, Diane Abbott, David Lammy, Mark Hendrick, Virendra Sharma, Rushanara Ali, Shabana Mahmood, Lisa Nandy, Chuka Ummuna, Chi Onwurah, Yasmin Qureshi, Keith Vaz, Khalid Mahmood, Seema Malhotra, Kate Osamor, Naz Shah, Valerie Vaz, Clive Lewis, Imran Hussain, Thangnam Debbonaire, Rosena Allin-Khan, Eleanor Smith, Preet Gill, Tan Dhesi, Mohammad Yasin, Marsha de Cordova, Fiona Onasanya, Faisal Rashid and Bambos Charalambous

Conservative

Adam Afriyie, Shailesh Vara, Nadhim Zahawi, Sam Gyimah, Priti Patel, Sajid Javid, Kwasi Kwarteng, Helen Grant, Rehman Chishti, Ranil Jayawardena, Nusrat Ghani, Suella Fernandes, Rishi Sunak, James Cleverly, Alan Mak, Alok Sharma, Seema Kennedy, Kemi Badenoch and Bim Afolami

Lib Dem

Layla Moran

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Featured image: Layla Moran