About Mark Pritchard (politician)
Mark Andrew Pritchard (born 22 November 1966 and formerly known as Mark Mallon) is a British Conservative Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for The Wrekin since 2005. == Early life and career == Mark Pritchard was born on 22 November 1966. He was brought up and educated in Herefordshire. He remarked on BBC Radio 4 that he comes from an "unorthodox background" for a Conservative MP. For the first five years of his life he was brought up in an orphanage in Hereford, and later grew up in foster care, living in a council house. He told his local newspaper that his early years were years of "love and warmth", and that he did not have "a single bad memory" of his time in the orphanage. Pritchard was first elected for the Conservative Party as a councillor on Harrow Council in London. Under his former name of Mark Mallon, he was elected as the Conservative Party candidate at a by-election for Pinner West ward in January 1993, but lost his seat at the council elections in May 1994, coming fifth. A supporter of Margaret Thatcher, Pritchard worked as the campaign manager to her successor in Finchley, Hartley Booth, who served in Parliament between 1992 and 1997. Pritchard, under his previous name Mallon, co-wrote a book with Booth on the subject of long-term unemployment and homelessness, which they self-published in 1994, shortly after Booth resigned as a parliamentary private secretary following press revelations of a relationship with a House of Commons researcher. After working for Hartley Booth, Pritchard spent a brief period at Conservative Central Office, working as a press officer, in the 1997 general election campaign.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.