Faithful in the small things: from plumbing to parliament

When Hannah Spencer of the Green Party traded pipe wrenches for a seat in Westminster, it made headlines, but it also echoed a deeper biblical pattern. Writer, Alex Noel explores how God often uses the hidden faithfulness of ordinary work as preparation for extraordinary callings.

Can a plumber fix your political problems? For a majority of voters in the recent Gorton and Denton by-election the answer is ‘yes’. On 26 February, they elected plumber and Green Party candidate, Hannah Spencer, as their new member of Parliament.

Though she’s relatively new to politics, Hannah, 34, already has a track record of solving problems and getting things done. She has worked as a plumber since leaving school at 16. And bit by bit has honed and added to her skills through apprenticeships and trainee schemes, setting up her own company, ‘Hannah’s Household Plumbing’ after completing a Prince’s Trust (now King’s Trust) programme in 2015.