Born in Liverpool in 1966, Kit attended Sudley County Primary school and then Liverpool College before studying Politics and Economics at Newcastle University. He was active in student journalism and theatre, working as Features Editor for The Courier and appearing onstage at the Newcastle Playhouse.

After he graduated, Kit moved to London and qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Deloitte & Touche. He then turned his sights on business, getting involved in a number of startups including County Finance Group where he is still Chairman and majority shareholder.

In 1998 Kit made good on a longstanding passion for politics by running for Westminster Council. He won and within three years was elected Deputy Leader and Cabinet member for Finance, handling a budget of more than £1 billion.  In partnership with the late Sir Simon Milton, who was leader of the Council, he helped take Westminster to the top of the local government league tables with the lowest council tax in the country.

In 2006 Kit stood down from the Council and in May 2008 he was elected to the London Assembly for the seat of West Central, which comprises the boroughs of Westminster, Kensington & Chelsea and Hammersmith & Fulham. Boris Johnson asked Kit to lead the fight on crime, Boris’s top priority, and appointed him Deputy Mayor for Policing handling a £3.5 billion budget and 53,000 employees.

During his time at the Met, Kit brought a renewed vigour and focus to crime fighting with a particular emphasis on combatting the alarming rise in youth violence, and violence against women, quadrupling the number of Rape Crisis Centres in London.  By 2012, the number of youth murders had more than halved and overall the number of homicides was at an historic low. Crime had fallen over 10%.

When he was re-elected in 2012, Boris asked Kit to tackle jobs and growth, the number one priority for his second mayoral term, and he appointed Kit Deputy Mayor for Business & Enterprise. In that capacity Kit was vice chair of the London Enterprise Panel, which is chaired by the mayor, and chair of London & Partners, the promotional agency for the city. On his departure employment levels in the capital were at the highest level ever and London had been successfully positioned as the science and tech centre of Europe.  London had also been named the most visited city on the planet and the leading city for foreign direct investment.

Kit stood down as Deputy Mayor in March 2015 and left the London Assembly at the elections in May 2016.

In July 2015 Kit was selected from a large field to succeed Sir George Young MP as the conservative candidate for North West Hampshire in the general election set for May 7th 2015.

Once the votes were counted 11 months later, Kit was declared the winner and new Member of Parliament for North West Hampshire. He won the support of 32,052 voters, representing 58.1% of those voting and had a 23,943 majority over the second placed candidate.

At the 2017 General Election, he was re-elected with 36,471 votes which was 62.1% of the total and the highest vote share in the constituency since the seat was formed in 1983. In 2019 he was again returned to office with the same share of the vote but with an increased majority of 26,308.

During his time on the backbenches Kit was a member of the Treasury Select Committee and Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Groups on Life Sciences and Assisted Dying. He is one of the leading proponents of assisted dying in the House and also campaigned vigorously on behalf of small business and on a variety of children’s issues.

In the January 2018 reshuffle he was appointed as a government minister in the Department of Work and Pensions where he was Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Family Support, Housing and Child Maintenance.

In the reshuffle of July 2018 he was promoted to Minister of State for Housing and Planning at the Ministry of Housing, Community and Local Government, leading the government’s chief priority: to build more homes across the country.

In the reshuffle of July 2019, following the leadership election, he was further promoted to Minister of State at the Home Office with responsibility for Crime, Policing and the Fire Service, leading on the Prime Minister’s first priority, fighting crime.

With the change of Prime Minister in 2022 Kit was made Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster running the Cabinet Office during the difficult hot summer, and then Secretary of State for Education, before he declined a position in Rishi Sunak’s cabinet and returned to the back benches to concentrate on constituency work.

Kit is married with three children and in what spare time he has he likes to garden, read and write. He is an avid Solent sailor and amateur naturalist.

Westminster Council Campaigns led by Kit

• Outlawing Prostitute Cards in Telephone Boxes
• Cutting Council Tax to Zero
• Fighting Congestion Charging
• Challenging the 2001 Census

Policing and Crime strategies devised and led by Kit

• Time for Action – Preventing Youth Violence
• The Way Forward – Action on Violence Against Women
• Met Forward – Focussing on Fighting Crime – the MPA mission
• Met Forward 2 – Focussed on Fighting Crime

Other Campaigns of Particular Interest

• Calling for Action on Dangerous Dogs
• Combatting Alcohol Crime with Compulsory Sobriety
• Forcing Action on Female Genital Mutilation
• Quadrupling Rape Crisis Centres in London
• Defending Chelsea Barracks
• Life Sciences in South East England
• The Drive for More Apprenticeships
• A Hydrogen Future for the UK

Political Timeline

Education and Career Timeline