A Cardiff woman has been named this year’s Ms Great Britain. Emma Powell, 31, has made history after becoming the first Welsh-born winner to claim the title.
The competition saw 68 woman of all ages and backgrounds take part this year. The final took place in Leicester on Friday, October 18, and saw Emma win the title for the women aged 30-44 category, while 19-year-old Miss Edinburgh Ava Morgan became the 79th winner to hold the Miss Great Britain title. Find out about the latest events in Wales by signing up to our What’s On newsletter here.
Ms Powell is an academic who holds a degree in international business, a graduate diploma in law and a masters in HR from Cardiff University. Emma also campaigns to raise awareness about speech and language processing disorders following her son Leo’s diagnosis in 2023.
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Following from her win on Friday, she said: “I am absolutely elated to have won – it means the world to me. I will continue to advocate for my son’s condition but I also want to inspire others to speak up for people and causes just like my son, who do not have a voice. I want to empower Great Britain to speak up for those who need to be heard.”
The 2024 finalists had impressively raised £102,000 for the competition’s chosen charities – Leicester Alex’s Wish: Curing Duchenne and Cancer Research. Cancer Research UK announced that for their organisation alone, the finalists have raised a quarter of a million pound in the last decade.
According to its organisers, despite having not been televised since the 1980s, The Miss Great Britain competition has seen a huge surge in applicants in 2024. They added that this year the competition, which began 1945 as the ‘Bathing Beauty Queen’ contest, attracted record-numbers of non-UK born contestants, with ladies competing with roots in Estonia, Azerbaijan, Columbia, Spain and and further afield.