Victoria Mary Prentis, ( Boswell; born 24 March 1971) is a British politician who has served as the

Attorney General for England and Wales His Majesty's Attorney General for England and Wales is one of the law officers of the Crown and the principal legal adviser to sovereign and Government in affairs pertaining to England and Wales. The attorney general maintains the Attorney G ...

since October 2022. Prentis has served as the

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

for

Banbury Banbury is a historic market town on the River Cherwell in Oxfordshire, South East England. It had a population of 54,335 at the 2021 Census. Banbury is a significant commercial and retail centre for the surrounding area of north Oxfordshir ...

since

2015 File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the April ...

. She is a member of the

Conservative Party The Conservative Party is a name used by many political parties around the world. These political parties are generally right-wing though their exact ideologies can range from center-right to far-right. Political parties called The Conservative P ...

. Prentis was

Parliamentary Private Secretary A Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) is a Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom who acts as an unpaid assistant to a minister or shadow minister. They are selected from backbench MPs as the 'eyes and ears' of the minister in the ...

(PPS) to junior ministers in the

Department for Transport The Department for Transport (DfT) is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for the English transport network and a limited number of transport matters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland that have not been devolved. The ...

between July 2016 and June 2017, and was the

(PPS) to the

Leader of the House of Commons The leader of the House of Commons is a minister of the Crown of the Government of the United Kingdom whose main role is organising government business in the House of Commons. The leader is generally a member or attendee of the cabinet of t ...

from June 2017 until February 2020. She was appointed

Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Farming, Fisheries and Food A parliamentary system, or parliamentarian democracy, is a system of democracy, democratic government, governance of a sovereign state, state (or subordinate entity) where the Executive (government), executive derives its democratic legitimacy ...

in February 2020, and was promoted to become Minister of State for Farming, Fisheries and Food in September 2021, during the second

cabinet reshuffle A cabinet reshuffle or shuffle occurs when a head of government rotates or changes the composition of ministers in their cabinet, or when the Head of State changes the head of government and a number of ministers. They are more common in par ...

of the second Johnson ministry. She was appointed Minister of State for Work and Welfare by Prime Minister

Liz Truss Mary Elizabeth Truss (born 26 July 1975) is a British politician who briefly served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from September to October 2022. On her fiftieth day in office, she stepped dow ...

in September 2022. After Liz Truss resigned and

Rishi Sunak Rishi Sunak (; born 12 May 1980) is a British politician who has served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party since October 2022. He previously held two cabinet positions under Boris Johnson, lastly as ...

became Prime Minister, Prentis was appointed

. She was appointed to the

Privy Council A privy council is a body that advises the head of state of a state, typically, but not always, in the context of a monarchic government. The word "privy" means "private" or "secret"; thus, a privy council was originally a committee of the mo ...

on 27 October 2022. She was re-elected as Banbury's MP in

2017 File:2017 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The War Against ISIS at the Battle of Mosul (2016-2017); aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing; The Solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 ("Great American Eclipse"); North Korea tests a s ...

and

2019 File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...

Early life and career

Prentis was born Victoria Boswell, in

, and grew up on the family farm in nearby

Aynho Aynho (, formerly spelt ''Aynhoe'') is a village and civil parish in West Northamptonshire, England, on the edge of the Cherwell valley south-east of the north Oxfordshire town of Banbury and southwest of Brackley. Along with its neighbou ...

. She has two sisters. She was educated at

Royal Holloway, University of London Royal Holloway, University of London (RHUL), formally incorporated as Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, is a public research university and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It has six schools, 21 academic depa ...

and

Downing College, Cambridge Downing College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge and currently has around 650 students. Founded in 1800, it was the only college to be added to Cambridge University between 1596 and 1869, and is often described as the old ...

, from where she received degrees in English and Law respectively. She is the daughter of Lord Boswell of Aynho, who was MP for

Daventry Daventry ( , historically ) is a market town and civil parish in the West Northamptonshire unitary authority in Northamptonshire, England, close to the border with Warwickshire. At the 2021 Census Daventry had a population of 28,123, making ...

from 1987 to 2010. Prentis qualified as a

barrister A barrister is a type of lawyer in common law jurisdictions. Barristers mostly specialise in courtroom advocacy and litigation. Their tasks include taking cases in superior courts and tribunals, drafting legal pleadings, researching law and givin ...

in 1995. She joined the

Civil Service The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil servants hired on professional merit rather than appointed or elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leaders ...

in 1997, leaving in November 2014. Her last job for the government was co-leading (in a jobshare) the "Justice and Security team" at the

Treasury Solicitor's Department The Government Legal Department (previously called the Treasury Solicitor's Department) is the largest in-house legal organisation in the United Kingdom's Government Legal Service. The department is headed by the Treasury Solicitor. This office g ...

Parliamentary career

In November 2014, Prentis was selected as the Conservative candidate for the Banbury constituency at the 2015 general election. She retained the

safe seat A safe seat is an electoral district (constituency) in a legislative body (e.g. Congress, Parliament, City Council) which is regarded as fully secure, for either a certain political party, or the incumbent representative personally or a combina ...

for the Conservatives (held by them since 1922). In Parliament she sat on the

Justice Select Committee The Justice Select Committee of the United Kingdom is a select committee of the House of Commons which scrutinizes the policy, administration, and spending of the Ministry of Justice. In addition, the committee examines the work of the Law Offi ...

and the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments. Prentis is an opponent of

High Speed 2 High Speed 2 (HS2) is a planned high-speed railway line in England, the first phase of which is under construction in stages and due for completion between 2029 and 2033, depending on approval for later stages. The new line will run from its m ...

, believing it will affect her constituency. She rebelled against the Conservative government when the HS2 Bill received its second reading in the House of Commons in March 2016. Prentis was a founding supporter of Conservatives for Reform in Europe, a group which campaigned in support of the UK's membership of a reformed

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are located primarily in Europe, Europe. The union has a total area of ...

. Accordingly, she declared that she would vote remain in the 2016 referendum on the UK's membership of the EU. Prentis supported

Theresa May Theresa Mary May, Lady May (; née Brasier; born 1 October 1956) is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2016 to 2019. She previously served in David Cameron's cab ...

's candidacy during the 2016 Conservative leadership contest. She was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to junior ministers in the Department for Transport in July 2016. She was re-elected as the MP for Banbury in the 2017 general election. In May 2019, she endorsed candidate

Rory Stewart Roderick James Nugent Stewart (born 3 January 1973) is a British academic, diplomat, author, broadcaster, former soldier and former politician. He is the president of GiveDirectly, a visiting fellow at Yale University's Jackson Institute for ...

for the leadership of the Conservative Party. Prentis stated that she voted to remain in the European Union but has since given her support to Boris Johnson's deal. In February 2020, Prentis joined the

Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for environmental protection, food production and standards, agriculture, fisheries and rural communities in the United K ...

as the

Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (or just Parliamentary Secretary, particularly in departments not led by a Secretary of State) is the lowest of three tiers of government minister in the UK government, immediately junior to a Minister ...

for Farming, Fisheries and Food. In January 2021, Prentis said during an interview that her jaw did not drop when she read the

EU–UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement The EU–UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) is a free trade agreement signed on 30 December 2020, between the European Union (EU), the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom), and the United Kingdom (UK). It provisionally applied fro ...

which includes farming, fisheries and food because she was "very busy organising the local nativity trail". She voted in favour of the agreement in-line with government policy. In March 2022, Prentis was the first British MP to take a Ukrainian refugee in her house amidst the War in Ukraine. On 7 September, Prentis was appointed Minister of State for Work and Welfare at the

Department for Work and Pensions , type = Department , seal = , logo = Department for Work and Pensions logo.svg , logo_width = 166px , formed = , preceding1 = , jurisdiction = Government of the United Kingdom , headquarters = Caxton House7th Floor6–12 Tothill Stree ...

by Prime Minister

in the

Truss Ministry Liz Truss was invited by Queen Elizabeth II—two days before the monarch's death—to succeed Boris Johnson as prime minister of the United Kingdom on 6 September 2022. Johnson resigned as leader of the Conservative Party the previous day a ...

. Following the appointment of

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is ...

on 25 October 2022, Prentis was appointed by him as

and was officially sworn in as such on 16 November 2022. She was appointed to the

on 27 October 2022 and sworn of it on 14 December 2022. As is tradition for those appointed as Attorney General who are not already

King's Counsel In the United Kingdom and in some Commonwealth countries, a King's Counsel (post-nominal initials KC) during the reign of a king, or Queen's Counsel (post-nominal initials QC) during the reign of a queen, is a lawyer (usually a barrister or ...

, Prentis was appointed as King's Counsel on 23 November 2022.

Personal life

Prentis is married to Sebastian Prentis, a judge in the Insolvency and Companies Court, whom she met when they were both students at the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

. The couple have two daughters and live in

Somerton Somerton may refer to: Places Australia * Somerton, New South Wales * Somerton Park, South Australia, a seaside Adelaide suburb ** Somerton Man, unsolved case of an unidentified man found dead in 1948 on the Somerton Park beach * Somerton, Victoria ...

Oxfordshire Oxfordshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the north west of South East England. It is a mainly rural county, with its largest settlement being the city of Oxford. The county is a centre of research and development, primaril ...

Notes

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Prentis, Victoria 1971 births Living people Alumni of Royal Holloway, University of London Alumni of Downing College, Cambridge British civil servants Attorneys General for England and Wales Advocates General for Northern Ireland Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies Daughters of life peers Female members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies People from Banbury UK MPs 2015–2017 UK MPs 2017–2019 21st-century British women politicians People from Aynho UK MPs 2019–present 21st-century English women 21st-century English people English King's Counsel 21st-century King's Counsel Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom