Prominent climate campaigner and former Conservative Party minister and member of Parliament Alok Sharma will be the newest British Indian peer when he takes his seat in the House of Lords after being conferred a peerage by King Charles.
Sharma, 56, chose not to seek re-election in last week’s general election, and was named on former prime minister Rishi Sunak’s Dissolution Peerages list. The Agra-born MP, who was knighted as Sir Alok in the King’s New Year’s Honours list last year for his contribution to tackling climate change through his leadership as president of the COP26 climate summit over two years ago, will becomes Lord Sharma in the new Parliament.
Sharma's Reading West constituency, like several others across the UK, had undergone a boundary change to become Reading West & Mid Berkshire.
“This has not been an easy decision for me. It has been the honour of my life to serve as the MP for a constituency in the town where I grew up and a privilege to serve in government and represent the UK on the international stage,” Sharma said, when he announced his decision in September last year to not contest the next general election.
“I will continue to support my Conservative colleagues and serve my constituents diligently for the remainder of my time as an MP, as well as champion in Parliament the causes I care deeply about, especially climate action,” he added.
Sharma was selected as a parliamentary candidate in 2006 and has served as a Tory MP since 2010. In his role as Cabinet minister since then, he has been appointed Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and International Development until he was conferred a Cabinet-level role as COP26 president by former prime minister Boris Johnson in January 2021.
Under Rishi Sunak as prime minister, he was on the House of Commons backbenches and often spoke out to express his concerns about the government’s delay in certain targets towards meeting the country's climate action Net Zero pledge by 2050.
