A FORMER parliamentary candidate is to take up a new post with the UN in the autumn.

Purna Sen, who lost out to Green MP Caroline Lucas at the polls in May, will take up a new role at UN Women headquarters in New York City in September.

The Labour candidate was given a post-election boost when in the week after her defeat in the polls she was offered the position of director of policy for UN Women.

Ms Sen told The Argus as a senior UN official she will be responsible for providing “direction, leadership and management” to the UN Women Policy Division, as well as the UN Women Training Centre.

She said: “This position is an excellent means through which I can take forward over thirty years of work on equality, discrimination, violence against women, human rights, and social justice. “