David Laws

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**David Laws**

Elected MP	2001
Predecessor	Paddy Ashdown
Date of Birth	30 Nov 1965
Political Party	Liberal Democrat

David Anthony Laws (born 30 November 1965) is a politician in the United Kingdom. He is Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament for Yeovil, Paddy Ashdown's old seat, and was first elected in 2001. He is Liberal Democrat Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary.

After a substantial swing against the Liberal Democrats following the resignation of Paddy Ashdown, Laws regained some of the lost ground at the 2005 election with an increased majority of over 8000.

After graduating with a double first from King's College, Cambridge in Economics, Laws went into investment banking, becoming a Vice President of JP Morgan and then Managing Director of Barclays de Zoete Wedd. He left in 1994 to take up the role of economic adviser to the Liberal Democrats. From 1997-1999 he was the party's Director of Policy and Research.

On his election to parliament he became a member of the Treasury Select Committee, and in November 2001 he was appointed the party's deputy defence spokesperson. A year later took up the position of Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury and launched a spending review.

He was appointed the Liberal Democrats' Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary in 2005, a position in which he has been highly critical of the government's handling of the Child Support Agency and flaws in the tax credits system.

He is the co-editor of the Orange Book (2004).

Shadow Chancellor George Osborne claimed he offered Laws, who is generally seen, along with other Orange Book authors, as being on the right-wing of the Lib Dems, a seat in the Shadow Cabinet, but was rebuffed, with Laws saying "He is not a Tory." ^[1]