Woman with Mayo roots elected as Labour MP

A woman with Mayo-born grandparents has been elected to the UK’s House of Commons, writes Oisín McGovern.

Newly-elected Labour MP for South Derbyshire, Samantha Niblett, has roots in both Ballintubber and Newport through her grandmother and grandfather.

Ms Nibblet’s parental grandmother was Margaret O’Malley from Skehanagh, Ballintubber and her grandfather was Jimmy Doherty from Newport.

Her grandparents emigrated from Mayo to Nottingham in the 1950s, where they married and reared their family.

One of their sons, Jim Doherty, Ms Niblett’s father, worked as a detective in the Nottingham area for several years.

In June, The Guardian newspaper tipped her as one of the Labour Party’s rising new stars.

Prior to pursuing a successful career in technology, Niblett left home at 17 and moved eight times during her A-level year.

In October 2022, she founded ‘Labour: Women in Tech’ to encourage more girls and women into STEM careers.

She was elected in the Conservative party stronghold of South Derbyshire after receiving 17,734 votes to unseat the sitting Tory MP, Heather Wheeler, who held the seat for 14 years. She received 38.8 percent of the vote in the constituency, which had seven candidates in total.