Julia

Julia Lopez seems like a hard-working MP from her Twitter feed, but it's not obvious why she's ended up at the DCMS. She went to see The Tina Turner Musical for an anniversary treat on the day she was appointed; she follows, as she should, Hornchurch FC; and celebrated a recent DCMS grant for The Queen's Theatre, Hornchurch. 

Julia, 37, was born in Julia Dockerill, in Harlow, Essex. She went to Hertfordshire and Essex High School, then read Social & Political Sciences at Queens' College, Cambridge. She worked as a researcher for Conservative MP Mark Field, and continued during his time as a minister. She was co-author with Field of the books The Best of Times and Between the Crashes. In 2016 she was famously photographed in Downing Street, emerging from a Brexit strategy meeting, carrying notes which read "What's the strategy ?  Have cake and eat it". 

In 2014, she was elected as a councillor on Tower Hamlets Council, and won the safe seat of Hornchurch and Upminster in June 2017, beating Simon Jones and Shaun Bailey in the shortlisting. In September that year, she married her British-Australia-born-in-El-Salvador-partner Lorenzo Lopez, and they had a baby daughter in October 2019. In February 2020, she joined the Cabinet Office, with Digital Britain responsibilities, and has been sent to the dispatch box more than once to stonewall questions aimed at Michael Gove.