Tom Harris MP, Labour, Glasgow South

Tom Harris is Labour MP for Glasgow South, whose personal blog has won best Labour blog; best left of centre blog; best Scottish blog and best MP blog in the 2009 total Politics political blog awards.

Tom is a former reporter who n January 1993 became a press officer with Strathclyde Regional Council, a post he held until local government reorganisation in April 1996, when he became the senior media officer for Glasgow City Council. Six months later he became public relations manager for East Ayrshire Council and in 1998 was appointed as chief public relations and marketing officer with Strathclyde Passenger Transport Executive, or SPT.

In June 2001, he became Labour MP for Cathcart and was subsequently selected and elected in 2005 as Labour's candidate for the new Glasgow South seat. In September 2006, Tom was appointed Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Transport, with responsibility for rail, light rail and cycling. When Gordon Brown became prime minister in June 2007, Tom was re-appointed to transport with an expanded remit which included railways and the trunk road network. At the reshuffle in October 2008, however, Tom returned to the back benches.