Joy Morrissey

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Joy Morrissey
MP
Official portrait of Joy Morrissey MP crop 2.jpg
Official portrait, 2019
Member of Parliament
for Beaconsfield
Assumed office
12 December 2019
Preceded byDominic Grieve
Majority15,712 (27.2%)
Ealing London Borough Councillor
for Hanger Hill
In office
22 May 2014 – 13 April 2020[1]
Personal details
Born
Joyce Rebekah Inboden

(1981-01-30) 30 January 1981 (age 41)
Indiana, US
Nationality
  • United Kingdom
  • United States
Political partyConservative
Spouse(s)
  • Matthew Mark Damschroder
    ​
    ​
    (m. 2001, divorced)​
  • William Morrissey
    ​
    (after 2001)​
Alma materLondon School of Economics
Websitejoymorrissey.uk

Joyce Rebekah "Joy" Morrissey (née Inboden, 30 January 1981)[2][3] is an American-born British politician. A member of the Conservative Party, she has served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire since 2019.[4][5]

Early life[]

Morrissey was born in Indiana, in the United States.[2] She attended Worthington Christian High School in Ohio and graduated in 1999.[6] Morrissey received a master's degree specialising in European Social Policy from the London School of Economics.[7] After completing her postgraduate studies, Morrissey attained British citizenship and is now a British-American dual national.[8]

Acting career[]

In the late 2000s, Morrissey had a brief acting career. Under the name Joy Boden she appeared alongside Marisa Tomei in a TV movie titled The Rich Inner Life of Penelope Cloud, which she also produced, and which her now-husband directed. Geek Mythology (2008), described in The Guardian as a "bonkfest", "about a man who acquires a magical statue that makes him irresistible to women", was a straight-to-video feature.[9][10][11][12] After becoming a mother, she decided not to return to the film industry, stating that she "actually looked at going back to get (her) PhD in International Development but got involved with the local Ealing Conservatives".[10]

Filmography[]

  • The Rich Inner Life of Penelope Cloud (2007, TV movie)
  • Geek Mythology (2008, video)
  • Only One Can Play (2009, short film)

Political career[]

London[]

Morrissey was an elected a Conservative councillor on Ealing Council, where she represented the ward of Hanger Hill (named after the area of the same name) until April 2020.[1]

She was a London-wide list candidate at the 2016 London Assembly election, but was not elected.[13]

Morrissey unsuccessfully contested Ealing Central and Acton at the 2017 general election. The seat was one of a number in London which had been marginal before the election, but the seat saw a large swing towards the incumbent Labour MP Rupa Huq.[14][15]

In 2018, she unsuccessfully sought nomination to be the London Conservatives mayoral candidate for the 2021 London mayoral election, making it through to the final three shortlist.[16]

Member of Parliament[]

In 2019, Morrissey was selected as the new Conservative candidate for Beaconsfield. At the 12 December election Morrissey defeated former Conservative Dominic Grieve, who had represented Beaconsfield since 1997 and contested the seat as an independent.[17][4] Upon election she became the third ever American-born female MP, after The Viscountess Astor and Beatrice Rathbone.

In 2020, Morrissey was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.[18]

In June 2021 Morrissey launched a campaign with the British Monarchist Society, to put a portrait of the monarch in every home, company, and institution that would like one.[19][20]

On 15 December 2021, Morrissey tweeted that chief medical officer Chris Whitty should follow Boris Johnson's lead on Covid precautions, and asserted that Britain was not a "public health socialist state", after Whitty advised that people should deprioritise unnecessary social gatherings before Christmas during the start of the Omicron variant outbreak. Morrissey said that unelected scientific experts ought to defer to elected politicians. After she was criticised for attacking the Chief Medical Officer as a government PPS, she deleted the tweet.[21][22] She was criticised for her position in the media, with an emphasis on her lack of qualifications in comparison to Whitty.[9]

References[]

  1. ^ a b "Councillor Joy Morrissey". Ealing Council. Retrieved 28 April 2020.
  2. ^ a b "Election of Joy Morrissey keeps American headcount in UK Parliament at three". 28 February 2020. Retrieved 27 July 2020.
  3. ^ Brunskill, Ian (19 March 2020). The Times guide to the House of Commons 2019 : the definitive record of Britain's historic 2019 General Election. p. 94. ISBN 978-0-00-839258-1. OCLC 1129682574.
  4. ^ a b "Beaconsfield parliamentary constituency - Election 2019". BBC.com. Retrieved 13 December 2019.
  5. ^ Jones, Amy (9 November 2019). "Meet the Brexiteer candidate taking on Dominic Grieve in this general election". The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 29 February 2020.
  6. ^ "Worthington Christian grad earns a spot in UK's House of Commons". Worthington Christian School. 10 March 2020. Retrieved 12 May 2020.
  7. ^ "London mayoral race: Conservative candidate profiles". BBC News. 30 July 2018. Retrieved 3 January 2020.
  8. ^ "Election of Joy Morrissey keeps American headcount in UK Parliament at three". American Expat Financial News Journal. 28 February 2020.
  9. ^ a b Weaver, Matthew (17 December 2021). "Chris Whitty v Tory MP Joy Morrissey: who to believe on Covid?". The Guardian. Retrieved 18 December 2021.
  10. ^ a b "London mayoral race: Conservative candidate profiles". BBC News. 30 July 2018.
  11. ^ "Joy Boden". IMDb.
  12. ^ "Ealing's Local Web site".
  13. ^ "London-wide Assembly Member candidates, 2016". 1 April 2016. Archived from the original on 12 August 2016. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
  14. ^ "The career of Tory candidate Joy Morrissey in the spotlight". Ealing Today. 5 June 2017. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
  15. ^ "Ealing Central and Acton election results: Labour's Rupa Huq wins at General Election". Evening Standard. 8 June 2017. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
  16. ^ Proctor, Kate (28 September 2018). "Tories choose Shaun Bailey for mayoral candidate to take on Sadiq". Evening Standard. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
  17. ^ Lambert, Harry (11 December 2019). "A Tory rebel's last stand". NewStatesman. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
  18. ^ List of Parliamentary Private Secretaries (PPS): April 2020 (Report). GOV.UK. 9 April 2020. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
  19. ^ "Tweet". Twitter. Retrieved 9 July 2021.
  20. ^ Williams, Tom (24 June 2021). "Tory MP wants every home in Britain to have a portrait of the Queen". Metro. Retrieved 9 July 2021.
  21. ^ Woodcock, Andrew (16 December 2021). "Demand for apology from Tory MP after 'outrageous' attack on Chris Whitty". The Independent. Retrieved 16 December 2021.
  22. ^ Hall, Sam (16 December 2021). "Covid latest news: Tory MP attacks 'unelected' Chris Whitty over calls for Britons to scale back Christmas plans". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 16 December 2021.

External links[]

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Member of Parliament
for Beaconsfield
2019–present 		Incumbent
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