Following a tumultuous few weeks in politics, Britain has a new Prime Minister in waiting, Theresa May.
She’s apparently fierce, conservative and has a surprising penchant for leopard-print kitten heels. She’s also an ABBA fan.
May will be the country’s second female leader — the first being fellow Conservative Margaret Thatcher — a title she had been vying for against Andrea Leadsom, who announced yesterday that she was pulling out of the leadership contest.
The 59-year-old will succeed David Cameron, who resigned following the shocking result of the Brexit vote, which will see the UK exit the European Union.
While May was officially in favour of remaining (some say un-enthusiastically so) in the EU, she insisted that “Brexit means Brexit” and vowed to “make a success of it”.
So, who is Theresa May?
From 2010 until yesterday, May was Britain’s Home Secretary, which is widely considered one of the toughest jobs in government.
Formerly, she was also the Minister for Women and Equalities.
In terms of her political ideology, she’s a liberal conservative known for her tough stance on immigration, but is generally considered a no fuss, dogged politician who has repeatedly been compared to Germany’s Angela Merkel, despite holding a starkly different stance on refugees.
While she is widely regarded as a fairly straight-laced individual, she has a well-publicised collection of leopard-print kitten heels, is a keen cricket fan and quite the home chef, once revealing that she owns more than 100 cook books.
May, whose father was an Anglican vicar, studied at Oxford and one of her favourite songs is ABBA’s Dancing Queen, according to the BBC.
During her campaign for the leadership, she also talked about the need for more housing, better industrial policy, promised to tackle inequality, crack down on individual and corporate tax avoidance and vowed to reunite the fissure created in her party by the Brexit vote.