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Sal Brinton

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The Right Honourable
The Baroness Brinton
Official portrait, 2018
Leader of the Liberal Democrats
Acting
13 December 2019 – 1 January 2020
Serving with Sir Ed Davey
DeputySir Ed Davey
Preceded byJo Swinson
Succeeded bySir Ed Davey & Mark Pack (acting)
President of the Liberal Democrats
In office
1 January 2015 – 1 January 2020
LeaderNick Clegg
Tim Farron
Sir Vince Cable
Jo Swinson
Davey · Herself
Preceded byTim Farron
Succeeded byMark Pack
Member of the House of Lords
Lord Temporal
Incumbent
Assumed office
4 February 2011
Life peerage
Lib Dem Group Leader on Cambridgeshire County Council
In office
May 1997 – October 2004
Preceded byMaurice Leeke
Succeeded byJulian Huppert
Cambridgeshire County Councillor
for Castle
In office
6 May 1993 – October 2004
Preceded byJ Mitten
Succeeded byJohn White
Personal details
Born
Sarah Virginia Brinton

(1955-04-01) 1 April 1955 (age 69)
Paddington, London, England
Political partyLiberal Democrats (1988 - present)
Other political
affiliations		Liberal (1975-1988)
Parent
RelativesMary Stocks, Baroness Stocks (cousin)
Alma materCentral School of Speech and Drama
Churchill College, Cambridge

Sarah Virginia Brinton, Baroness Brinton[1] (born 1 April 1955), known as Sal Brinton, is a British politician who served as president of the Liberal Democrats from 2015 to 2020. In November 2010 she was nominated to the House of Lords,[2] taking her place on 10 February 2011[3] having been created Baroness Brinton, of Kenardington in the County of Kent on 4 February.[4] After Jo Swinson lost her seat at the 2019 general election, Brinton and Sir Ed Davey became acting co-leaders of the Liberal Democrats.[5][6] After Brinton's term as party president ended, her successor Mark Pack also succeeded her as acting co-leader with Davey. Davey was elected as permanent leader of the party in 2020.

Early life and education

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Brinton was born in Paddington, London, in 1955.[7] She is the daughter of former Conservative MP Tim Brinton,[8] and the cousin of Mary Stocks, Baroness Stocks.

Brinton was educated at Benenden School and studied stage management at the Central School of Speech and Drama. She subsequently completed a degree in English literature at Churchill College, Cambridge, in 1981.[9][10]

Career

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Beginning her career in the mid-1970s at the BBC as a television floor manager, working on Playschool, Grandstand, Doctor Who, and other programmes, Brinton joined the Liberal Party in 1975[7] and became a Cambridgeshire County Councillor in 1993. She contested the parliamentary seat of South East Cambridgeshire at the 1997 and 2001 general elections.[citation needed]

Brinton served as bursar of Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge, from 1992 to 1997,[11] and Selwyn College, Cambridge, from 1997 to 2002.[12] In 1997 she won the East Anglian entrepreneurial businesswoman of the year award. She was also founder member of the Board of the East of England Development Agency from December 1998 to December 2004 (Deputy Chair from 2001 to 2004).[citation needed]

From 1999 to 2004, Brinton chaired the Cambridgeshire Learning and Skills Council.[13] She contested the Watford constituency at the 2005 general election, coming second to incumbent Labour MP Claire Ward. She stood at Watford at the next election in 2010, this time coming second behind Conservative candidate Richard Harrington and reducing Ward to a third-place finish. She is a non-executive director of the Ufi Charitable Trust, a charity giving grants in the vocational educational technology sector.[14]

Brinton is a member of the Liberal Democrat Federal Policy Committee and Vice Chair of the Federal Conference Committee.[15] She also chairs the Liberal Democrat Diversity Engagement Group, with a particular interest in increasing the number of women, black, Asian, and minority ethnic MPs.[16] Baroness Brinton was a member of the All Party Stalking Inquiry of 2011.[17]

In 2014, Brinton was elected as the president of the Liberal Democrats, defeating Daisy Cooper and Liz Lynne, and took up her position on 1 January 2015.[18]

Personal life

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Brinton has rheumatoid arthritis and so usually uses a wheelchair. She met her husband Tim when she worked at the BBC. They live together with their family in Watford.[7]

Honours

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In 2003, Brinton was awarded an honorary PhD for her contribution to education, skills and learning by Anglia Ruskin University.[19] In November 2013, she was made a Fellow of Birkbeck, University of London.[20] She is Patron of Christian Blind Mission UK, Trustee of the United Kingdom Committee of UNICEF, a Trustee of the Ufi Charitable Trust, and a Director of the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust Ltd.[21]

Coat of arms of Sal Brinton
Escutcheon
Per pale Argent and Gules a lion salient double queued between three annulets counterchanged.
Supporters
Dexter a British WW1 fighter pilot vested Proper; sinister an archer bearded Proper vested Vert collared Argent cuffed and belted Or the crossbelt Sable buckled Argent booted and holding in the sinister hand a longbow Proper wearing a hat Vert attached thereto two plumes Argent.
Motto
Lex Et Salus (Law & Health)[22]

References

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  1. ^ "In full: New working peers". BBC News. 19 November 2010.
  2. ^ Bowcott, Owen (19 November 2010). "Party donors and political apparatchiks appointed working peers". The Guardian. Retrieved 19 November 2010.
  3. ^ "House of Lords Hansard for 10 Feb 2011 ( pt 1 )". Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). House of Lords. 10 February 2011. col. 347.
  4. ^ "No. 59695". The London Gazette. 9 February 2011. p. 2247.
  5. ^ "Jo Swinson quits as Lib Dem leader after shock loss". Evening Standard. 13 December 2019. Retrieved 16 June 2020.
  6. ^ "Sir Ed Davey and Baroness Sal Brinton will become the joint acting leaders of the Liberal Democrats following Jo Swinson's election defeat, the party has said". LBC. Retrieved 13 December 2019.
  7. ^ a b c "About Sal (Sal Brinton)". salbrinton.co.uk. Retrieved 15 February 2021.
  8. ^ "Tim Brinton". 29 March 2009 – via www.telegraph.co.uk.
  9. ^ "memim.com". memim.com. Archived from the original on 10 March 2016.
  10. ^ Profile Archived 21 March 2014 at the Wayback Machine, Cambridge University News; accessed 20 March 2014
  11. ^ "For staff". www.admin.cam.ac.uk.
  12. ^ "Power players for the regions". 1 January 1999.
  13. ^ "Cambridgeshire Learning and Skills Council". Archived from the original on 21 March 2014.
  14. ^ "UFI Charitable Trust, Dr Sal Brinton". Archived from the original on 8 December 2013.
  15. ^ "Sal Brinton". Liberal Democrats. 22 January 2014.
  16. ^ "Liberal Democrat Leadership Programme" Archived 2 September 2013 at the Wayback Machine
  17. ^ "Protection Against Stalking" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 20 April 2013.
  18. ^ "Sal Brinton elected as new Liberal Democrat Party President". 29 November 2014. Retrieved 29 November 2014.
  19. ^ "Honorary award holders – Anglia Ruskin University".
  20. ^ "Baroness Brinton — Birkbeck, University of London". www.bbk.ac.uk.
  21. ^ Profile, parliament.uk; accessed 20 March 2014.
  22. ^ Debrett's Peerage. 2019.
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Party political offices
Preceded by President of the Liberal Democrats
2015–2019 		Succeeded by
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