Above the college workbench where Hannah Spencer has been training to be a plasterer, her fellow students recently added a sign: “Ministry of Plastering and Plumbing – Hannah Spencer MP”.
Four weeks ago, the title might have felt faintly ridiculous to a 34-year-old plumber, who only entered politics in 2023. Now, it is very real after Spencer was elected as the first Green party MP in the north of England, overturning a large majority in a once-safe Labour seat in a win that could reshape British politics for years to come.
Taking to the podium at the Manchester Central convention complex at 4.30am on Friday, Spencer was visibly overwhelmed.
Before the traditional party line, though, she had an apology to make to her customers: “I think I might have to cancel the work that you had booked in, because I’m heading to parliament,” said the new MP for Gorton and Denton, adding: “When I get there, I will make space for everyone doing jobs like mine. We will finally get a seat at the table.”
Spencer, a Green party councillor in nearby Trafford, had virtually no name recognition in this part of south-east Manchester 30 days ago. Then she was everywhere: “Hannah the plumber” on the streets, online, on billboards.
Speaking to the Guardian on a canvassing trip around Denton, she admitted it was a struggle to come to terms with her new profile. “I can’t go anywhere on my own now,” she said, crossing a Morrisons car park, shadowed by a towering security guard and a PR person.
The Greens had called in security after an irate member of the public walked past their campaign hub and shouted repeatedly: “Fake plumber!”
It was one of the many wild and erroneous claims about her online – another being that she was married to a multimillionaire AstraZeneca executive – but they had a real-world impact. “It was scary,” she said. “He was so angry.”
Queueing to hand out leaflets in the car park early in the campaign, canvassers joked with her about the rumours of a secret wealthy husband. “It’s honestly ridiculous,” Spencer laughed. “I can’t even get a text back.”
The Green party has confirmed that Spencer did buy a house with a principal scientist who worked at AstraZeneca, according to the Times, but the pair are now separated and in the process of dividing their assets.
A party source said: “Hannah’s ex-partner worked hard to save up and put down the deposit on an uninhabitable building that is in the process of being renovated.
“Hannah’s name is currently on the paperwork and, like many people who have gone through a similar process will know, it can be complex and takes time to untangle personal financial and living arrangements.”
Spencer grew up in Bolton, about 20 miles north-west of the seat. After leaving school at 16, she trained to become a plumber before starting her own business, Hannah’s Household Plumbing, in 2015, aged 24.
While working she also returned to education, first to train as a gas engineer and then as a plasterer on an intensive course, which she passed with distinction. She continued her training most Thursdays during the campaign. “The other students definitely bring me back down to earth,” she said.
Spencer was not from a particularly politically active family, but was radicalised by the Covid pandemic, Partygate, and the brutal inequalities it exposed. She joined the Greens in 2022, later saying it was because she was “so angry at the gap between the super-rich and all the rest of us getting bigger”, and was elected as a councillor for Hale ward on Trafford council in 2023.
She was seen as a rising star and is close to Zack Polanski, the eco-populist who became leader of the Greens in September. Like him, she is much more likely to be talking about issues at the front of voters’ minds – the cost of living and the NHS – than solar panels or windfarms.
Her first taste of politics on the national stage was only two years ago, when she finished fifth in the re-coronation of Andy Burnham as Greater Manchester mayor. She also came fifth while contesting Warrington North in the 2024 general election.
In the past month Spencer and her party have been accused of “whipping up hatred” by mobilising Muslim voters over the war in Gaza. She has appeared on leaflets written in Urdu dressed in a keffiyeh, the Middle Eastern scarf associated with Palestine, and has urged voters to “make Labour pay”.
Spencer called the claims “disappointing”, saying she had spoken to “tens of thousands of people across the constituency”.
As polls closed on Thursday night, Spencer bedded down on a friend’s floor after marking iftar, the breaking of the fast in the holy month of Ramadan. When she woke up, she had made history.
