Penny Mordaunt: Ex-MP Status, Current Work, Personal Life

There is a good chance the last time you saw Penny Mordaunt she was carrying the Sword of State through Westminster Abbey, not losing a parliamentary seat. In July 2024 Labour’s Amanda Martin beat her in Portsmouth North by 780 votes, ending 14 years of Conservative representation. What follows sorts the confirmed record of that exit — and the reported work she has taken on since — from the private details that public files leave open.

Born: 4 March 1973, Torquay, Devon · Party: Conservative · MP for Portsmouth North: 2010–2024 · Last Cabinet role: Leader of the House of Commons, 2022–2024

Eight rows, one pattern: the confirmed record is almost entirely professional — the gaps are personal.

What has happened to Penny Mordaunt?

The compact version: she entered the Commons in 2010, spent nine ministerial posts and four Cabinet roles climbing through government, and left the same night the Conservatives lost power.

What is Penny Mordaunt’s political background?

• The ministerial record is the part that is easy to verify: nine posts, four of them in Cabinet, including Secretary of State for International Development (2017–2019) and Defence Secretary (May–July 2019) — the latter making her the first woman in that role.
• Her final Cabinet job was Leader of the House of Commons and Lord President of the Council, held under Rishi Sunak from September 2022 until the 2024 election (Reuters, global news agency).

When did Penny Mordaunt’s Commons career end?

• Formally, on 30 May 2024, when Parliament was dissolved ahead of the general election. Politically, on election night, when the result came in.
• The numbers in Portsmouth North were stark: Amanda Martin (Labour) 14,495, Mordaunt 13,715, a majority of 780 (Reuters, global news agency).
• Her immediate response, reported by ITV News, was that she intended to continue serving Portsmouth and contributing to the country outside Parliament (ITV News, UK commercial broadcaster).
• Her assessment of the party, reported by the Daily Echo, was blunter: the Conservatives had failed to honour voters’ trust (Daily Echo, Southampton daily).

The implication: Mordaunt did not leave by choice, and she did not pretend otherwise. The 780-vote margin reads narrowly, but the 18% swing behind it tells the real story — the constituency moved decisively, not marginally.

Is Penny Mordaunt still an MP?

No. Mordaunt is not a sitting member of the House of Commons, and there is no record of a seat in the House of Lords.

Is Penny Mordaunt in the House of Lords?

• No appointment to the Lords has appeared in the BBC’s or Reuters’ reporting of her departure.
• Her parliamentary record closes on 30 May 2024, the date Parliament was dissolved.

Why did Penny Mordaunt leave Parliament?

• She did not retire; she was defeated. On election night, BBC reporting confirmed she had ceased to be a Member of Parliament (BBC News, UK public broadcaster).
• Her post-defeat comments, reported by ITV News and the Daily Echo, framed the loss as a party failure as much as a personal one.

What this means: the ‘Lords’ question has no sideways answer. Mordaunt left the Commons because voters in Portsmouth North replaced her, and nothing in the official record shows a peerage being conferred instead.

What is Penny Mordaunt doing today?

Her post-2024 life is where the record gets harder to pin down.

What does Penny Mordaunt do now?

• According to Wikipedia’s summary of press reports, her portfolio mixes corporate and charitable work: part-time paid advisory roles with British American Tobacco and SubSea Craft, a reported chairwomanship of the Coalition for Global Prosperity, a July 2025 report on antisemitism co-authored with Labour peer John Mann, and — in February 2025 — news that she was completing an application to rejoin the Conservative candidates list (Wikipedia, crowd-sourced encyclopedia).
• The charitable leg is real on paper: she was reported in September 2025 as president of The Music Man Project, succeeding the late MP David Amess, and the charity provides music education and performance opportunities for people with disabilities.
• Her X feed has kept a running commentary on defence spending, resilience, energy costs, modern regulation, and national debt.

The signal in that list is consistency: these are not random board seats. They map onto the briefs she held in government — defence, security, resilience — and onto the policy language she used in the Commons right up to dissolution.

Did Penny Mordaunt write a book?

• Yes: Greater: Britain After the Storm, co-authored with Chris Lewis and published in 2021.

The pattern: Mordaunt is treating the post-Commons period as a portfolio career, not a retreat. The corporate roles pay; the charity roles lend purpose; the writing and the X posts keep her name in circulation.

The pattern: Mordaunt is building a public profile from outside Parliament, keeping her name active across multiple fronts while the political door remains theoretically open.

Where does Penny Mordaunt live now?

The direct answer: no official record publishes a current home address for her.

• Her political identity sits in Portsmouth: she represented Portsmouth North from 2010 to 2024, as detailed in the table above.
• She was born in Torquay, Devon, on 4 March 1973.
• Public records do not confirm whether she has moved since leaving office.

The catch: the silence is normal, and it is also a trap. Former Cabinet ministers are not required to publish home addresses, so the absence of one proves nothing — but it also means every claim about where she ‘really’ lives should be treated as unverified until an official source says otherwise.

Does Penny Mordaunt have kids?

The personal file is shorter than most searches assume.

• Public biographies and established media profiles report that Mordaunt has no children and that her marriage to Paul Murray ended in divorce (Wikipedia, crowd-sourced encyclopedia).
• She has described herself as a Christian in public interviews, without pinning down a denomination in official profiles.
• Age: she was born on 4 March 1973.
• Height: not stated in official parliamentary or government profiles.

What this means: the confirmed personal record fits on a few lines. Everything beyond it — current relationship status, religious denomination, physical details — is unsupported by the official file.

Penny Mordaunt’s career timeline

Ten dates, one through-line: a 14-year parliamentary career compressed, then reversed in a single night.

What this means: the arc is tight — a decade and a half in Parliament, four Cabinet posts, and then a 780-vote margin that ended the run. The reported 2025 roles extend the story rather than replace it: Mordaunt is building a platform that does not require a seat in the Commons.

Confirmed facts vs. what remains unclear

The line between the two is the difference between what voters can rely on and what a comeback narrative is still filling in.

The trade-off: official records are strong on her politics and nearly silent on her private life. That asymmetry is normal for former ministers, and it is exactly why the personal details floating around online should be treated as unverified.

The aftermath in quotes

Three short statements frame the moment — two from Mordaunt, one from the news record.

She intended to continue serving Portsmouth and contributing to the country outside Parliament.

— Penny Mordaunt, post-defeat statement, as reported by ITV News (UK commercial broadcaster)

The Conservative Party had failed to honour voters’ trust.

— Daily Echo (Southampton daily)

“Senior Conservative Penny Mordaunt loses parliamentary seat.”

— Reuters headline, 5 July 2024

The read: Mordaunt left the stage in her own words, but the headline belonged to the result. The defeat was reported as a political event before it was reported as a personal story.

The bigger picture

Mordaunt’s 14-year Commons career ended with a 780-vote defeat and an 18% swing against her, and the reported roles she has taken on since — advisory boards, a music charity, an antisemitism report — read as a deliberate effort to stay useful while she waits for a by-election door. For Conservative Party managers, the arithmetic is the lesson: an 18% swing can erase 14 years of incumbency in one night. For Mordaunt’s own comeback hopes, the test comes earlier than she might like: either a vacancy opens before the next general election, or the candidates-list application becomes a footnote in a profile already moving on.

Frequently asked questions

Related reading: Penny Mordaunt: What She’s Doing Now After Parliament · Penny Mordaunt: Career, Personal Life, and Current Activities