In news that has made our year, Hannah Spencer has been announced as the winner of the Gorton and Denton by-election, beating the Reform candidate to secure a seat as an MP for the Green Party. It feels like a rare piece of good news in what's been quite a tough few years politically, to say the least.
Between the news of the brutal force used by ICE agents against unarmed civilians across America and the release of the Epstein Files to Reform coming for our Equality Act rights, and the recent far-right protests in Manchester, it sometimes feels like the world's coming to an end. So, it was a relief to wake up this morning to a timeline cleanse for a change, that Hannah Spencer is now a Green MP. The People's Princess is passionate about lifting up the working class and crafted a campaign around relatability and championing wealth equality. She also happens to be a plumber.
Dying to know more? Here's everything you need to know about Hannah Spencer:
Who is Hannah Spencer?
How often does it look like a politician could be your best mate? Not often, I'd say, considering the majority are old, white men. So, what a breath of fresh air it is to see a younger person elected to parliament, and not just that, but a woman.
The 34-year-old, who hails from Bolton, Manchester, symbolises a new era of politics, one that revolves around hope and not division. She has working-class roots, leaving school at 16 to train to become a plumber before starting her own business, Hannah’s Household Plumbing, in 2015, at the age of only 24. Her plumbing background caused some hilarity on the campaign circuit, with her earning the nickname ‘Hannah the Plumber’.
Despite not coming from a political background, she told The Guardian that she was ‘radicalised’ by the Covid pandemic, Partygate, and the ‘brutal inequalities it exposed’. In 2022, she joined the Green Party, saying it was because she was “so angry at the gap between the super-rich and all the rest of us getting bigger”, and she was then elected as a councillor for Hale ward on Trafford Council in 2023.
Her win in the Gorton and Denton by-election is particularly special as Manchester is so close to her heart. “I couldn’t be more proud to represent Gordon and Denton — and by that I mean the whole of Gorton and Denton," she said, hinting heavily at the racist and anti-immigrant overtones that were set by the area's Reform candidate. “I am so proud that we fought a positive campaign against the Reform Party that dances to the tune of their billionaire donors who don’t want to pay their fair share of tax, and the Labour Party, who have also stooped so low,” she said in her speech.
“Throughout this campaign, it’s been clear that the majority of people in Gorton and Denton share similar concerns: about the spiralling cost of bills and housing; about crumbling public services that have suffered years of underfunding; and about threats to our National Health service, which must be protected and restored, and must not be carved up and sold to the highest bidder.”
She's pledged to ‘make space for everyone doing jobs like mine’ when she enters parliament. Her campaign was largely fought on this premise; championing the ordinary, working people and striving to bring about wealth equality. “I can’t wait to get started and work to influence policy that makes lives better for people like us — to bring down the cost of living, introduce rent controls, and get the litter and fly tipping off our streets,” she said in her first speech after winning.
The MP is viewed as something of a rising star in the Green Party, and in UK politics more broadly, and is close with the Greens' eco-populist party leader, Zack Polanski.
The two are breathing new life into the Green party, challenging the traditional party politics of the likes of Labour and the Conservatives, who are both predicted to lose seats to Reform and the Greens when the next general election is due to be held this May. “We want an alternative to the stale, broken, old two-party politics,” she says. “That is the Green Party”.
If Hannah's win is a sign of things to come in 2026, then I have to say, I'm excited about it. Congratulations, Hannah Spencer!
Danny Kruger is obsessed with our “unregulated sexual economy.”
