Keir Starmer announced members of his Cabinet after officially becoming the prime minister of the U.K. on Friday.
Starmer received the blessing of King Charles III to form a government in a ceremony known as the “kissing of hands.” A photo of the occasion served as the official announcement of Starmer’s new title.
Earlier on Friday, Rishi Sunak offered his resignation as prime minister to the king.
Voters in the U.K. cast their ballots Thursday in a national election to choose the 650 lawmakers who will sit in Parliament for the next five years.
After more than a decade in power under five different prime ministers, Sunak’s Conservatives suffered a major defeat.
David Lammy has been appointed the foreign secretary, while Yvette Cooper is the home secretary looking after key issues including immigration and policing.
John Healey was named the defense secretary.
Pat McFadden, Labour’s national campaign coordinator, has been appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster – the most senior minister in the Cabinet after the prime minister.
Rachel Reeves has been appointed Treasury chief in Britain’s new Labour government, the first woman to hold the job.
Reeves was put in charge of the country’s finances on Friday by Prime Minister Keir Starmer. She gets a job and title, Chancellor of the Exchequer, that dates to the 16th century.
The former Bank of England economist faces the daunting task of delivering Labour’s promise to get the economy growing and invest in public services while working with a large national debt.
Starmer is appointing his Cabinet on Friday after winning a landslide election victory.
Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner has been appointed as Britain’s deputy prime minister.
Rayner was the first senior politician to be appointed by new Prime Minister Keir Starmer as he began the work of appointing his Cabinet.
Rayner, who has served as Starmer’s deputy party leader since 2020, will also take the role of the Secretary for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.
Rayner has often spoken about her tough background growing up in a deprived public housing block and leaving school early as a young mother.
She started her career as a trade union official before embarking on a career as a lawmaker.
Most diverse parliament in history
Starmer will oversee a parliament more ethnically diverse and more female than ever.
Black, Asian and ethnic minority lawmakers will represent around 13% of the House of Commons, up from 10% in 2019, when Britain last held a parliamentary election.
It will be the largest-ever share of ethnic minority members of the lower house, according to an analysis by British Future, a think tank.
In the 44 years since outgoing Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was born, minority representation in Britain’s parliament increased from zero to nearly one in seven lawmakers, British Future said.
But the share still does not fully reflect the diversity of the population and electorate. Around 18% of people in England and Wales come from a Black, Asian, mixed or ethnic minority background, according to official data.
“The 2024 election is a landmark for representation, with record diversity in our parliament, closer than ever to that of the electorate,” Sunder Katwala, director of British Future, said.
“The irony that it coincides with the end of Rishi Sunak’s premiership as the UK’s first British Asian Prime Minister only underlines how ethnic diversity has become a new norm across the main political parties.”
The incoming parliament will include a record 242 female lawmakers, 22 more than after the last election in 2019.
When Labour’s Diane Abbott, Britain’s first Black female lawmaker, entered parliament in 1987 there were just 41 women in the House of Commons.
Abbott, who was re-elected to the seat in northeast London which she has held for 37 years, will become the ‘mother of the house’ – an honorary title given to the longest-serving female minister.
While final results have yet to be announced, Labour triumphed in Thursday’s parliamentary election, winning around 412 seats, representing a majority of 174.
Britain’s new governing party will have by far the largest number of ethnic minority MPs – 66 out of the 87 elected. But that diversity is unlikely to be reflected in its top Cabinet when Starmer elects his front bench.
The ousted Conservative Party has a stronger record for diversity when it comes to ministerial-level representation.
Addressing the nation outside No 10 Downing Street on Friday in his final speech as prime ministers, Sunak said: “One of the most remarkable things about Britain is just how unremarkable it is that two generations after my grandparents came here with little, I could become prime minister.”
Sunak was the country’s first British-Indian leader and all three female prime ministers were Conservatives.
