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The Rt Hon John Bercow MP

Speaker of the House of Commons, The Rt Hon John Bercow MP, graduated from the University of Essex in 1985 and was the last National Chairman of the Federation of Conservative Students from 1986 to 1987. He was elected to the House of Commons as the Conservative Member of Parliament for Buckingham in 1997 after unsuccessful campaigns in 1987 and 1992 in Motherwell and Bristol South. He served in the Shadow Cabinets of Iain Duncan-Smith and Michael Howard and was made a Patron of the Tory Reform Group in 2006. He was elected Speaker of the House of Commons in 2009 replacing Michael Martin and defended his seat in Buckingham comfortably in 2010 despite a high-profile challenge from Nigel Farage.