Emma Harper


Emma Harper is a Scottish politician who is a Scottish National Party MSP for the South Scotland region, elected at the 2016 Scottish Parliament election.

Early life

Harper was born and raised on a farm near Stranraer where her father was a dairyman. She attended Stranraer Academy. In 1978, the family moved to a farm near Annan and she attended Annan Academy prior to her nurse training in Dumfries at the Royal College of Nursing and Midwifery.
Harper has worked in hospitals in NHS Scotland and NHS England, and at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California, United States. Her work included: transplant and trauma surgery, before going on to lead nursing surgical teams and provide specialist clinical education.
Harper is a degree-registered nurse and a member of the Royal College of Nursing and the Association for Perioperative Practice.
As a keen Burnsian Harper is past president of Dumfries Ladies Burns Club Number 1.

Political career

Harper joined the SNP in 2010.
In 2015 she stood for the UK Parliament as SNP candidate for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale & Tweeddale. She finished second and achieved a huge swing of +27.5% of the vote for the SNP, narrowly losing the seat by only 798 votes.