ABOUT

Malcolm Harbour was elected to the European Parliament in June 1999, and re-elected in June 2004 and 2009. He is one of 2 Conservative members representing the West Midlands Region of the UK.  He is Chairman of the Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee and is a Member of the European Conservatives and Reformists Group. He is Vice-Chairman of the Parliament's Science and Technology Options Assessment Panel (STOA) and a Member of the Inter-Parliamentary Delegation to Japan.

Malcolm Harbour takes a special interest in the EU single market, industry, science and technology policy. He is Chairman of the European Manufacturing Forum, the Ceramics Industry Forum and the Conservative Technology Forum. He is a Governor of the European Internet Foundation. He has been the lead MEP (rapporteur) for major legislation on Telecoms, the Single Market and Motor Vehicle standards.

Since 2005, he has served on the CARS 21 High Level Group, a Europe-wide initiative to boost the automotive industry. He was named as a top 50 European of 2006 for his key role in broking agreement on the Services Directive. In May 2006, he was named the UK’s most Small Business Friendly UK Parliamentarian by members of the Forum of Private Business. In September 2010, he was voted Internal Market MEP of the Year.

Before his election to the Parliament, Malcolm Harbour spent 32 years in the motor industry, as an engineer, a senior commercial executive, a consultant and a researcher. He began his motor industry career in the BMC Longbridge Plant as an Austin Engineering Apprentice in 1967. 

Malcolm Harbour was born in February 1947. He was educated at Bedford School and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated in Engineering, and at the University of Aston where he gained a Diploma in Management Studies. He received an Honorary DSc from Aston in 2008.