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Michelle Gildernew (born 1st January 1970 ) is an Irish republican politician. She is the Sinn Féin member of the British parliament for Fermanagh and South Tyrone. She first won the seat in the 2001 election, winning the seat (previously held by Ken Maginnis of the Ulster Unionist Party) with a majority of 53, due to a divided unionist vote. The defeated UUP candidate claimed that a voting station in the west of the constituency was kept open after the allotted time. Gildernew retained the seat in the 2005 vote, significantly increasing her majority to 4,582, although had the two main unionist parties agreed a voting pact (as in 2000), an agreed unionist candidate would have won both here and in South Belfast, with more unionists in both constituencies. In keeping with the Sinn Féin policy of abstentionism, Gildernew has not taken up her seat in the British House of Commons.

She is also a member of the currently-suspended Northern Ireland Assembly where she served as vice chair of the Committee of Social Development. She is a member of the Sinn Féin Ard Chomhairle (National Executive) and is the party's spokeswoman on equality and housing.

She comes from Dungannon, County Tyrone and was educated at the University of Ulster, Coleraine. Her family has a long history of grievances with the old Unionist-dominated Northern Ireland government when an unmarried, childless secretary to a local UUP politician, Emily Beattie, was given public housing in the town of Caledon in Tyrone over Gildernew's grandmother, the now-deceased Annie Gildernew, who had a large family. The moderate Nationalist (later SDLP) politician, Austin Currie, upon hearing about this helped organize protests and squats in retaliation against this and other discrimation against Catholics in housing. He later helped to set up the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association.

External links

• Guardian Unlimited Politics - Ask Aristotle: Michelle Gildernew MP
• TheyWorkForYou.com - Michelle Gildernew MP

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