Anna has been the MP for Broxtowe since May 2010 and in November 2010 was appointed as parliamentary private secretary in the Department of Health. Anna's grandmother was a nurse, her mother worked in the NHS for forty years as a radiographer, her brother works at the QMC Hospital in Nottingham and her sister in law works at a GP practise in Nottingham.

Anna read law at Birmingham University and trained to be a barrister. However a change in career led her to working as a journalist firstly on a newspaper and then in television. Anna worked for a number of years at Central TV in Nottingham and Birmingham and was a shop steward for the National Union of Journalists.

Anna returned to the Bar and practised as a criminal barrister based in Nottingham for fourteen years before her election to Parliament.