Gavin Barwell is the Operations Director of the Conservative Party

Gavin was educated at Trinity School, Croydon and Trinity College, Cambridge. In 1993, he was President of the Cambridge Union Society.

Before the 1997 UK general election, Barwell was Special Adviser to John Gummer, then Secretary of State for the Environment, on housing, local government and urban regeneration policy. He moved to Conservative Central Office, becoming Head of the Political Section in the Conservative Research Department responsible for briefing William Hague for Prime Minister's Questions. Between 1998 and 2003, he worked as Head of Local Government and then as Deputy Director with responsibility for General Election planning and local elections.

He is now Operations Director and Registered Treasurer of the Conservative Party. He is responsible for planning the party’s campaign for the 2005 General Election and Party Conference. He represents the Party's staff on the Board of the Party.

Barwell has been councillor for Coulsdon West in Croydon since 1998. He was Deputy Leader of the Conservative Group on Croydon Council, having previously served in a variety of front-bench roles. He was selected as Conservative candidate for Sutton and Cheam at the 2005 election but stood down for personal reasons.

Barwell was described as "hamster face, for indeed his visage is hamsterish" on now-defunct conservative website electricreview.com, a story which subsequently appeared in The Guardian [1].

He is married to Karen. They have one son, Jack.