Two MPs from the region – one from Tyneside and the other from Teesside – have been appointed to the government at minister of state level, just below the Cabinet, and a third has been made a whip.
Catherine McKinnell, MP for Newcastle North, becomes Minister of State at the Ministry of Justice, serving under Alex Norris, the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, and Anna Turley, MP for Redcar, is appointed Minister of State in the Home Office under Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood.
Catherine McKinnell, a lawyer by profession, was first elected in 2010 and won the Newcastle North (with boundary changes) for a fifth time in 2024 with a majority of 17,762.
She was Minister of State in the Education Department between July 2024 and September 2025, and in opposition held shadow ministerial posts in education and the Treasury and was Shadow Attorney General. She has sat on several House of Commons committees, most recently the Public Accounts Committee.
Anna Turley, a former civil servant and special adviser, was first elected MP for Redcar in 2015 but lost the seat in the 2019 general election. She regained it in 2024 with a majority of 3,323 and was a government whip in 2024-25 and chair of the Labour Party and Minister without Portfolio in the Cabinet Office in 2025-26.
Emma Foody, whose career included senior roles in the Labour Party and public services before being elected MP for Cramlington and Killingworth in 2024 with a majority of 12,840, gets her first government job as a whip, which comes with the title Vice Chamberlain of HM Household.
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