Nadhim Zahawi: Iraqi refugee to education secretary

Former vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi has been appointed the new education secretary, replacing the sacked Gavin Williamson.

"I must be one of the luckiest human beings on earth," Mr Zahawi has said when reflecting on his childhood.

Born in Iraq in 1967 he could easily have been sent to fight in the 1980s Iran-Iraq War.

Instead, he and his parents were forced to flee Iraq and he grew up in Britain.

His family had been influential in the country - his grandfather was the governor of the Central Bank of Iraq and his signature appeared on the country's banknotes.

However, when Saddam Hussein came to power in the late 1970s, his family came under threat.

Mr Zahawi's father, a businessman, got a tip-off that the authorities were coming for him and quickly arranged to fly out.

His son has recalled the anxiety of watching the plane preparing to take off from Baghdad Airport.

After all the passengers had boarded, a military vehicle drove up to the plane. His mother was in tears as they saw a passenger being removed from the plane.

The passenger turned out not to be his father, but the man who had been sitting behind him on the plane.

Mr Zahawi described it as a "traumatic" childhood moment "stamped on his memory".

So instead of growing up in Iraq, Mr Zahawi grew up in Sussex, where he was educated privately and became a keen equestrian.

But, as he was heading to university another disaster struck the family.

A business venture of his father's fell through, and he, in Mr Zahawi's words, "lost everything" except a brown Vauxhall car.

The young Nadhim Zahawi decided he would take the Vauxhall and become a minicab driver in order to help put food on the table.

But his mother insisted on her son going to university and pawned her jewellery so he wouldn't have to worry about the finances.

After studying chemical engineering at University College London, he followed in his father's entrepreneurial footsteps and set up a firm selling Teletubbies merchandise - a company which attracted investment from the then-Conservative politician Jeffrey Archer.

Lord Archer remembers the young Nadhim Zahawi as "a born organiser - if you said I need six taxis, three aeroplanes and a double decker bus, all in 30 minutes he went and did it."

Through Lord Archer's parties, Mr Zahawi met influential Conservative figures including the former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

In 1994 he became a Conservative councillor in Wandsworth, south London and three years later unsuccessfully stood for Parliament in Erith and Thamesmead.

When Lord Archer launched his campaign to become London mayor, Mr Zahawi joined his team.

But the candidate was forced to pull out of the race, and Mr Zahawi had to look for alternative work.

Along with another ex-member of team Archer - Stephan Shakespeare - he launched YouGov, an online polling company.

Having made his fortune, Mr Zahawi turned his thoughts once again to securing a seat in Parliament.

In 2010 he was successful, winning the safe Conservative seat of Stratford-Upon-Avon.

Parliament was still reeling from the MPs expenses scandal, and Mr Zahawi quickly became embroiled in his own transgression when it emerged he had claimed expenses to supply his stables with electricity.

He said he was "mortified by this mistake" and paid back the money.

It didn't hinder his political progress too much and in January 2018 then-PM Theresa May made him an education minister, with responsibility for children and families.

However, he quickly found himself in trouble for attending a gala held by the men-only Presidents Club.

Mr Zahawi's attendance at the event earned him a reprimand from Downing Street.

Despite labelling the current prime minister a "controversial face from the past", Mr Zahawi remained a minister when Boris Johnson came to power in July 2019, moving from the education to the business department.

Then in November 2020, in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, he was handed what he has called "the most important job I'll ever do" - the position of vaccines minister.

For almost 11 months he has overseen the rollout of the coronavirus vaccine programme, and has been able to boast a fair amount of success, especially earlier in the year when the UK raced ahead of many other countries.

Reflecting on his own skills, he says he "loves an operational challenge".

As this country's new education secretary he faces the unprecedented challenge of ensuring a whole generation of children can catch up after having missed months of school as a result of the pandemic.

It may yet proved to be an operational challenge too far, but he at least benefits from his previous experience as a minister in the education department.

David Hughes, chief executive of the Association of Colleges, says the new minister "knows the college sector well" and I absolutely expect that he will pick up the baton and continue to champion colleges".

Mr Zahawi's appointment has also been welcomed by one unlikely source.

Opposition Labour MP Jess Phillips tweeted: "He wouldn't be my choice obviously, but I genuinely feel relieved for the children of Birmingham including my own at this appointment."

And in a dig at his predecessor, she added: "Nadhim is competent and easy to work with and anyone would have been an improvement to be fair."