Claire Coutinho | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 Official portrait, 2024 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Shadow Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Assumed office 8 July 2024 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Leader | Rishi Sunak Kemi Badenoch | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Ed Miliband | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Shadow Minister for Equalities | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Assumed office 5 November 2024 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Leader | Kemi Badenoch | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Mims Davies | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office 31 August 2023 – 5 July 2024 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Prime Minister | Rishi Sunak | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Grant Shapps | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Ed Miliband | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Member of Parliament forEast Surrey | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Assumed office 12 December 2019 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Sam Gyimah | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Majority | 7,450 (15.1%)[1] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Personal details | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | Claire Coryl Julia Coutinho (1985-07-08)8 July 1985 (age 40) London, England | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Party | Conservative | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Spouse | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Children | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Education | James Allen's Girls' School | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Alma mater | Exeter College, Oxford (BA) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Website | www | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Claire Coryl Julia Coutinho (/kəˈtiːnoʊ/;[2] born 8 July 1985) is a British politician and former investment banker who has beenShadow Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero andShadow Minister for Equalities since 2024. A member of theConservative Party, she has been theMember of Parliament (MP) forEast Surrey since2019. Coutinho previously served in theCabinet asSecretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero from August 2023 to July 2024. She has been described as a close ally of former Prime MinisterRishi Sunak and an ardent supporter ofBrexit.
After graduating in mathematics and philosophy fromExeter College, Oxford, Coutinho worked as an associate at the investment bankMerrill Lynch for nearly four years, and co-founded, with food writer Mina Holland, a literary-themed events company called The Novel Diner. She also worked at the centre-right think tankCentre for Social Justice, at the industry groupHousing and Finance Institute created byNatalie Elphicke, and for accounting firmKPMG as a corporate responsibility manager. She left KPMG to become aspecial adviser atHM Treasury; initially working forJulian Smith, she became an aide to Sunak.
Coutinho joined the frontbench asParliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Disabled People in September 2022 under Prime MinisterLiz Truss. AfterTruss's resignation the following month, Coutinho endorsedRishi Sunak's successful leadership bid and subsequently was appointedParliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children, Families and Wellbeing inhis ministry. She was promoted to the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero in August 2023. After the defeat of the Conservative Party in the2024 general election, Coutinho became the Shadow Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero inSunak's Shadow Cabinet. She was reappointed to the position afterthe election ofKemi Badenoch as leader in November 2024, and gained the additional position of Shadow Minister for Equalities.
Claire Coryl Julia Coutinho was born on 8 July 1985 inLondon.[3][4] Her parents emigrated from India in the late 1970s and are ofGoan Catholic descent. Her late father Winston was ananaesthetist, and her mother Maria is ageneral practitioner (GP). She has one sister who is also a GP.[5][6][7][8] Coutinho attendedJames Allen's Girls' School, aprivate day school inDulwich,[9] before studying for a BA in mathematics and philosophy atExeter College, Oxford.[9][10]
After graduating, Coutinho worked as an associate at the investment bankMerrill Lynch for nearly four years.[9][11] In 2012, Coutinho and food writer Mina Holland founded a literary-themed events company called The Novel Diner.[12][13][14] Two years later, she appeared on the cooking game showThe Taste judged byAnthony Bourdain andNigella Lawson.[6] The Novel Diner was dissolved in 2015.[12]
Coutinho worked atIain Duncan Smith's centre-right think tankCentre for Social Justice for two years,[11] in the areas of financial inclusion, education, and regeneration policy.[15] As of 2016, she was a programme director for the industry groupHousing and Finance Institute created byNatalie Elphicke.[11][16] She also worked for accounting firmKPMG as a corporate responsibility manager.[17]
Coutinho left the company to become aspecial adviser atHM Treasury. Initially working forJulian Smith,[18] she then became an aide toRishi Sunak.[19] Coutinho has commented that she left KPMG to join the government as a special adviser so that she could help deliverBrexit "from the inside", having supported the Leave vote in the2016 EU membership referendum.[9]
Coutinho was selected as theConservative candidate forEast Surrey on 8 November 2019[20] after the2019 United Kingdom general election was announced at the end of October.[21] Described inThe Guardian as a "super-safe Conservative seat", East Surrey was previously held bySam Gyimah who defected to theLiberal Democrats in September that year.[22]
She was elected as MP for East Surrey at the2019 general election, which was held on 12 December, with 59.7% of the vote and a majority of 24,040.[23][24][25] This was almost exactly same share of the constituency vote that the Conservative Party has secured in theprevious election in 2017, when Gyimah took 59.6% of votes cast.[24]
In May 2020, she was criticised by several of her local constituents for supportingDominic Cummings, then the chief adviser toPrime MinisterBoris Johnson, in taking acontroversial 260-mile (420 km) trip from London to County Durham during a national lockdown in theCOVID-19 pandemic.[26] In June 2020, the windows of the East Surrey Conservative Association offices were graffitied with the words "liars, cheats, traitors" in black paint.[27]
Coutinho joined the advisory board of the centre-right think tankOnward in February 2020.[28] She was appointed as aParliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) toRishi Sunak in March 2020,[29][15][30] She was a senior fellow at the conservative think tankPolicy Exchange in 2021.[31] Coutinho resigned from her position as PPS on 6 July 2022 in protest at Prime Minister Johnson's leadership following theChris Pincher scandal,[32] and endorsed Sunak in thefollowing Conservative Party leadership election.[33]
Coutinho served asParliamentary Under Secretary of State for Disabled People between September and October 2022 andParliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children, Families and Wellbeing between October 2022 and August 2023.[34][35] The government signed a £19.5 million contract with consultancy Newton Europe in June 2022 to design and develop its Delivering Better Value (DBV) programme, which aimed to reduce budget deficits in the education of children withspecial educational needs and disabilities with a target of at least 20% cut in new education provision. In May 2023, Coutinho stated to theEducation Select Committee that there were no targets.[36]
In August 2023, Coutinho wrote to social landlords, housing associations and developers calling on them to let childminders work from rented properties. She commented that restrictive clauses in their contracts may stop them working from their homes.[37]
At the2024 general election, Coutinho was re-elected to Parliament as MP for East Surrey with a decreased vote share of 35.6% and a decreased majority of 7,450.[38] The Conservative Party lost the election,[39] and on 8 July 2024, she was appointed asShadow Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero inSunak's shadow cabinet.[40]
On 31 August 2023, Coutinho was appointed asSecretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, replacingGrant Shapps; she was the first of the MPs elected in 2019 to join the Cabinet, and at 38 was the youngest member.[12] In theDaily Telegraph, Daniel Martin and Ben Riley-Smith commented that Coutinho's appointment came at a time when Sunak's government was signalling "a subtle change of policy from the Government away from green causes".[41] They reported that a "senior government source" had stated that both Sunak and Coutinho were committed to planning for net zero, but would be looking to prevent people from facing large financial costs for the implementation of net zero plans.[41] The reporters noted that although she had previously supported both the preservation ofgreen belts and the expansion of wild rural spaces, she had also shown sympathy for owners of oilboilers, and speculated that she might overturn the policies of banning new oil boilers from 2026 and of banning new petrol and diesel cars from 2030.[41] Heather Stewart ofThe Guardian remarked that while Coutinho appeared to show a genuine interest in environmental issues, as evidenced by her membership of the Conservative Environment Network before becoming a minister, Sunak's position seemed to be to seek to gain votes by backtracking on the party's net zero commitments.[42]
In a speech at the2023 Conservative Party Conference, Coutinho claimed that theLabour Party supported the introduction of ameat tax. Factchecking charityFull Fact found no evidence of this. When pressed bySky News journalistSophy Ridge on her comments, she said that it was only a light-hearted moment in her speech and provided no evidence for her assertion.[43]
In April 2024, Coutinho replied to criticism from Chris Stark, the outgoing Head of theClimate Change Committee that provides independent advice to ministers, that Sunak's government had hampered progress on climate change.[44] Coutinho countered that the UK was the first major economy to reduce its emissions by half since 1990, and that she had made changes to the tax system to encourage investment in the energy sector.[44] She added that the government would be "sensible and pragmatic" in its plans for net zero, and avoid "heap[ing] costs on families".[44]
In the2024 general election, despite large Conservative losses across the country, Coutinho retained her seat with a reduced majority of 7,450.[45] InSunak's Shadow Cabinet she retained her energy brief as theShadow Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero. UponKemi Badenoch's victory in the Conservative leadership contest in November, Coutinho was retained as Shadow Energy Secretary and was given additional responsibilities as theShadow Minister for Equalities.[46]
Coutinho has been characterised as an ardentBrexit supporter,[47][7][42] and as a factional ally of Sunak.[42][7] Stewart wrote that "Like Sunak ... Coutinho has spoken with pride about her Indian background."[42] Rachel Cunliffe ofNew Statesman wrote that descriptions of Coutinho from Conservative Members of Parliament included that she was competent, "work-driven", "level-headed" and "forensic-minded".[7] Discussing Coutinho's reputation amongst her colleagues, Cunliffe remarked that "The common narrative is that Coutinho is a dedicated grafter who got lucky, backed the right person at the right time, and has been rewarded by a troubled prime minister desperately trying to surround himself with people he can trust."[7]
Coutinho married Adam Hawksbee, the head of external affairs at retailerMarks & Spencer, in July 2025 at theChapel of St Mary Undercroft in thePalace of Westminster. They had met while Hawksbee worked as deputy director of the centre-right think tankOnward in 2023. They have one son born in January 2025 atSt Thomas' Hospital in London. Coutinho discussed in an interview withThe Times in November 2025 that she was admitted to intensive care postpartum due toacute fatty liver of pregnancy.[5][48]
On 15 September 2023, Coutinho was sworn into thePrivy Council, entitling her to the honorificThe Right Honourable for life.[49]
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
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| Preceded by | Member of Parliament forEast Surrey 2019–present | Incumbent |
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Minister of State for Disabled People, Work and Health 2022–2022 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children, Families and Wellbeing 2022–2023 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero 2023–2024 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Shadow Secretary of State for Climate Change and Net Zero 2024–present | Incumbent |
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