Pamela Nash

Pamela Nash was elected Labour MP for Motherwell, Wishaw and Carluke on 4 July 2024 with 19,168 votes (49.1 per cent) and a majority of 7,085, defeating SNP incumbent Marion Fellows. She had previously represented Airdrie and Shotts from 2010 to 2015 before losing the seat in the SNP surge. Her predecessor in that first constituency was John Reid, the former Home Secretary and Defence Secretary, one of Scottish Labour's most senior figures. She was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary at the Ministry of Defence in the 2025 reshuffle, an unpaid government role on the lowest rung of the payroll vote rather than a ministerial office.

Born June 1984 in Airdrie and educated at the University of Glasgow, she was 25 when first elected in 2010, the youngest MP in the Commons at the time, and sat on the Science and Technology and Scottish Affairs Committees before losing to Neil Gray of the SNP in 2015.

Between 2015 and 2024 she was Chief Executive of Scotland in Union, the cross party campaign against Scottish independence. Under her leadership it issued tactical voting guidance that recommended Conservative votes in some seats to defeat the SNP, an unusual credential for a Labour politician however pragmatically it was framed. In February 2024, while already selected as Labour's candidate, she joined the General Election Advisory Board of 56 Degrees North, a Scottish public affairs consultancy, a connection that has attracted scrutiny.

Since returning to Parliament she has voted in 427 divisions with one rebellion, on the Crime and Policing Bill in June 2025, where she was one of 25 Labour MPs to vote against. She has been active on constituency issues including the Wishaw Neonatal Warriors campaign to prevent the SNP Scottish Government downgrading the neonatal unit at University Hospital Wishaw. Her campaign slogan was "Local Choice, National Voice."