Preet K. Gill

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Preet Kaur Gill is a British Labour Co-operative politician. She is the Member of Parliament (MP) for Birmingham Edgbaston since the 2017 general election. She is the first female British Sikh MP.

Life

Preet Kaur Gill was born in Edgbaston, Birmingham to Daljeet Singh Shergill and Kuldeep Kaur Shergill.[1] Her father was a foreman and later a bus driver and her mother worked as a seamstress.[2][3] Daljeet Singh was the longest serving president of the Guru Nanak Gurdwara Smethwick. Gill credits her father and Lord King (first Sikh life peer in the House of Lords) as her main inspiration for her later ambition to enter politics.[4][5] She has six younger siblings. Her early education was at Lordswood Girls' School and Bournville College. At the latter Gill was elected as student president.[3] Gill graduated from the University of East London with a first class BSc. degree in Sociology and Social Work.[6] After graduation, she worked as a social worker in a kibbutz in Israel and with street children in India.[3] She was elected as a councillor for Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council in 2012 and was re-elected in the 2016 local election. On the council she has served as the Cabinet Member for Public Health and Protection.[3][6][7] Gill supported remaining within the European Union (EU) in the 2016 EU membership referendum.[8]