First female chair elected for parliament’s housing select committee

Ms Eshalomi wrote on X: “Thank you to colleagues for supporting me to be elected the first female chair. Safe secure housing provided me and my family with stability growing up. I look forward to working cross-party, to hold the [government] to account on this important issue.”

In her bid to be the committee chair, Ms Eshalomi said in a statement that she was raised in a council home by her single mother, along with two sisters, after spending time in temporary accommodation. 

Ms Eshalomi sat on the cross-party housing select committee in the last parliament and was a shadow minister holding to account what was then called the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.

Housing secretary Angela Rayner reverted the department to its previous name – the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government – following Labour’s election victory in July.

Ms Eshalomi is also a former London Assembly member and served as a councillor for Lambeth Council earlier in her career. 

Under the allocation of committee chairs to political parties, only Labour was able to put forward candidates for the role.

Shaun Davies, Labour’s newly elected MP for Telford, was the only other candidate in the election. He secured 121 votes.

In May, the committee made a string of recommendations in a report on the finances and sustainability of the social housing sector. The report is yet to have a government response. 

The committee is responsible for scrutinising the policy, administration and spending of the government department.