MEP Nikki Sinclaire 'overwhelmed' by support as UK’s first 'sex-change parliamentarian'

Nikki Sinclaire MEP (Getty)

MEP Nikki Sinclaire says she is “overwhelmed” by the volume of support she received after revealing herself as Britain’s first “sex-change parliamentarian” after undergoing gender reassignment surgery more than two decades ago.

Ms Sinclaire, 45, the MEP for the West Midlands as part of the single-issue We Demand A Referendum Now party, said in a series of tweets on Sunday that she had received support “from across the political spectrum”.

In her new autobiography Never Give Up, released on November 25, Ms Sinclaire writes for the first time about her “great secret” of growing up as a boy. Until now it was only “close friends and family” were aware of her past, which “tormented” her early years .

The foreword reads: “As the first ‘sex change’ parliamentarian in Britain, Nikki Sinclaire has made history. But she is likely to be far happier, in the future, being known less as a statistic than for her conviction politics.”

In an interview with The Sun on Sunday Ms Sinclaire said she lived as a man until she was 23, before having her gender reassignment surgery on the NHS. “I don’t want my past to overshadow it and believe my constituents will continue to support me,” she said.

In the book she writes about the rocky start to her career as an MEP. She was elected in 2009 as part of Ukip, but was expelled at the beginning of 2010 for refusing to sit with the eurosceptic Europe of Freedom and Democracy (EFD), Ukip’s allies, because the EFP contained “extreme elements”, including people with “openly homophobic opinions”.

West Midlands Police arrested her in February last year as part of a probe into allowances and expenses but she denies the allegations. She remains on bail.