Joanne Marie Anderson (born 7 January 1971)‘It’s place first, not party first’: city mayors on how they are reshaping English politics
The Guardian, 9 July 2022 is a British Labour Party politician who has served as the second

Mayor of Liverpool The mayor of Liverpool is the executive mayor of the city of Liverpool in England. The incumbent mayor is Joanne Anderson, who was elected in May 2021. The mayor of Liverpool was previously branded 'the most powerful politician in England outs ...

since May 2021. She previously served as the Liverpool City Councillor for the Princes Park ward from October 2019 to May 2021. She is the first woman to be Mayor of the city and the first black woman to be a directly elected mayor in the UK. Anderson is due to leave office in May 2023, in line with the abolition of the post of directly-elected mayor of Liverpool.

Early life

Anderson was born in

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

in 1971. She has said that growing up under

Margaret Thatcher Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. S ...

's government made her feel like she was "at the bottom of the pile" and that she would not "amount to much". Anderson left school at 16 with no qualifications, but completed a degree in Business Studies as a mature adult. She completed a BA in business studies at Liverpool John Moores University between 1996 and 1999, and is currently completing an

MBA A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...

at the same university. Anderson has had a successful career as an equality, diversity and inclusion practitioner and a business consultant.

Career

Anderson's profession is mainly as a freelance business consultant, but she has also worked as a civil servant for the

Crown Prosecution Service The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is the principal public agency for conducting criminal prosecutions in England and Wales. It is headed by the Director of Public Prosecutions. The main responsibilities of the CPS are to provide legal advi ...

for over a decade. She previously worked as a community consultant and has worked as an advisor and a member of the board of trustees for various organisations, including Emmaus Merseyside (a charity providing work and housing to homeless people in the UK), Merseyside Probation Service, and Merseyside Equality and Employment Law. She was elected as a

councillor A councillor is an elected representative for a local government council in some countries. Canada Due to the control that the provinces have over their municipal governments, terms that councillors serve vary from province to province. Unl ...

for the Princes Park ward in a by-election in October 2019 with 73% of the vote, and has served on the Education and Children's Services Select Committee.

Mayor of Liverpool

Anderson became

Labour Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

's candidate for

following the announcement by incumbent Mayor Joe Anderson (no relation) that he would not run for re-election following his arrest in December 2020. She became the party's candidate after the selection process re-opened and the three initial candidates (Acting Mayor

Wendy Simon Wendy Simon is a Labour Party politician who exercised the powers and duties of the office of Mayor of Liverpool from 2020 to 2021. Mayor Joe Anderson temporarily stepped aside in December 2020. Although Anderson formally remained as Mayor unt ...

, Lord Mayor

Anna Rothery Anna Rothery is a British politician who served as the Lord Mayor of Liverpool from September 2019 to May 2021. She was elected Mayor of Liverpool with 59.2% of the vote in a second round of voting, since she failed to secure 50% of the votes in the first round. She is the first black woman to be a directly elected Mayor in the UK. She has vowed to campaign to end violence against women and girls and implement the recommendations of the Caller Report, which highlighted "serious failings" in the city council's leadership.

AOC Arms Fair

A controversial arms fair event was held at Liverpool's Exhibition Centre despite widescale protests and objections. The venue is part of the Arena and Convention Centre in Liverpool, which is owned by Liverpool City Council but run by a separate company. Mayor Joanne Anderson, along with a number of members of her top team, has publicly stated that she fundamentally disagrees with the holding of the arms fair, an event that was booked way before her time in office. Joanne stated that the council is powerless in stopping the event from take place, and trying to do so would leave the authority open to legal challenges. In a statement, Mayor Anderson said: "AOC Europe 2021 raises serious moral and ethical questions. I am appalled that this event is being held in Liverpool – in one of our buildings. Many of you have been in touch with me to outline, in no uncertain terms, your views. I am a pacifist and I have been consistently clear that I am in absolute agreement with you. I have sought extensive soundings from our legal team, but based on their expert advice, regrettably there is nothing that I as Mayor, or the council, can do to prevent this event from taking place. What I won’t do, is subject our council to legal challenge at a time when our resources are so limited." Mayor Joanne Anderson has called on ACC Liverpool to implement a motion passed by Full Council in July, requesting that the venues adopts an ethical charter and update their risk register to include risk embarrassment and negative association for Liverpool City Council. This will ensure that future potential events are considered in line with the fundamental values of Liverpool before being accepted.

Personal life

Anderson described herself as a single mother of a teenage boy in 2018, and has said that she has faced bankruptcy several times. She has called herself a "proud black, working-class Scouser who loves our city and its people". Anderson is a fan of City of Liverpool FC, citing her preference for the team over either of the city's two most famous teams (

Liverpool FC Liverpool Football Club is a professional football club based in Liverpool, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. Founded in 1892, the club joined the Football League the following year and has p ...

and

Everton FC Everton Football Club () is an English professional association football club based in Liverpool that competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The club was a founder member of the Football League in 1888 and has comp ...

) because it is "community owned and operated" and represents unity within the city, in contrast to the rivalry between Liverpool and Everton. Referencing the team's trademark colour, which combines the colours of Liverpool and Everton, she

tweeted Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

, "We are a proud footballing city with a rich and historic affiliation to the sport. Mix blue with red, you get purple."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Anderson, Joanne 1970s births Living people Year of birth uncertain Liverpool City Council Alumni of Liverpool John Moores University Labour Party (UK) councillors Labour Party (UK) politicians Mayors of Liverpool Women councillors in England Women mayors of places in England