Rt Hon Liam Byrne MP is a writer, reformer, and campaigner. A former Cabinet minister, Liam has done some of the toughest jobs in the British government. In the Home Office, he rebuilt the UK’s immigration system; in No 10 Downing Street, he helped Gordon Brown coordinate government during the global financial crisis, and in Her Majesty’s Treasury, he was Chief Secretary, charged with creating the Labour government’s fiscal consolidation plan. He is currently Shadow Digital Minister.
Liam graduated at the top of his class at Manchester University, where he won the Robert McKenzie Prize for Political Science and was elected leader of the Students’ Union. Before entering politics, he was an entrepreneur and a Fulbright Scholar at the Harvard Business School. In 2004, he gave up his successful business career to serve one of Britain’s poorest communities: Hodge Hill in East Birmingham. He has doubled his majority at every election.
Today, Liam is the founder and chairman of the All Party Group on Inclusive Growth, and the Labour think-tank, Red Shift. The paperback version of his book, a history of British capitalism, Dragons, was published earlier this year. He is also the author of Robbins Rebooted (SMF, 2014), Reinventing Government Again (SMF, 2004), and Local Government Transformed (Baseline, 1996). His most recent book is Black Flag Down, Counter-extremism, defeating ISIS and winning the battle of ideas.
Liam is one of Westminster’s leading authorities on China. He helped begin the UK-China Economic and Finance Dialogue, sits on the board of the GB-China Centre, co-founded the UK-China Young Leader’s Roundtable, and authored the critically-acclaimed Turning to Face the East (Guardian Books, 2013).