Edward was elected as the Member of Parliament for the Melton and Syston constituency at the General Election held in July 2024, having previously served as the MP for Charnwood since 2015. Following the boundary changes to constituencies in Leicestershire, a large part of the former Charnwood Seat was joined with the Borough of Melton, and Sileby from the Loughborough Seat, to form the new Melton and Syston constituency.
Born in 1977, and originally from Kent, Edward attended his local state grammar school before studying for a history degree at Oriel College, Oxford. Both his parents were teachers, his mother originally from a farming family and his father from an army family.
After university Edward moved to London and spent four years as Political Adviser to the then Shadow Foreign Secretary. Following that, he spent almost a decade working for private sector businesses including Hedra, Mouchel, and Serco, in management consultancy and communications roles.
Edward has always taken an active role in his community, having previously served as a school governor, a non-executive board member of a regeneration and employment charity, on the board of an NHS Trust and as a City Councillor in Westminster.
Since his election to Parliament in 2015, he has held a number of Ministerial roles, including Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice, Minister of State for Health between September 2019 and July 2022, and subsequently HM Paymaster-General & Minister for the Cabinet Office attending Cabinet, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, and between October 2022 and July 2024, Minister of State for Justice. Since the 2024 General Election and change of Government, Edward has served as Shadow Lord Chancellor and Shadow Secretary of State for Justice.
Edward lives locally in the heart of the Melton and Syston constituency, & in London, with his wife Laetitia, and in their free time they enjoy gardening, cooking, and watching cricket, rugby, & horse racing.
Edward said: “I care passionately about our local area, its towns and villages, its public services, character, environment, and its people - that’s because my wife and I live locally in the Melton and Syston constituency, so this is our community, and these are public services we use, just like you. They matter to us.
Since I was first elected to Parliament in 2015 I have achieved much for the community I served, but there’s still much I want to deliver for our area, so it’s a huge privilege to have been re-elected to Parliament as the MP for Melton and Syston, and I look forward to repaying the trust that has been placed in me by local people, and will work hard to serve the whole community.”