Women MPs in Brum

It occurred to me it might be interesting to look at which women have represented the people of Birmingham in Parliament.  Edith Wills was the first woman MP in the city serving from 5 July 1945.  It had always seemed to me that we had been well represented with a high proportion of our MPs being women.  It seems not.  Whilst that may have been true for a while, it seems they all served at the same time.  Only 10 women have been an MP in Birmingham.  Here they are:

Name	Election date	Party	Constituency	From	to	Years
Edith Wills	5 Jul 1945	Labour	Duddeston	1945	1950	5
Dame Edith Pitt DBE	2 Jul 1953	Conservative	Edgbaston	1953	1966	13
Dame Jill Knight, DBE	31 Mar 1966	Conservative	Edgbaston	1966	1997	31
Mrs Doris Fisher	18 Jun 1970	Labour	Ladywood	1970	1974	4
Miss Sheila Wright	3 May 1979	Labour	Handsworth	1979	1983	4
Rt Hon Clare Short	9 Jun 1983	Labour (’06 – Ind Lab)	Ladywood	1983	2010	27
Dr Lynne Jones	9 Apr 1992	Labour	Selly Oak	1992	2010	18
Rt Hon Baroness Estelle Morris	9 Apr 1992	Labour	Yardley	1992	2005	13
Ms Gisela Stewart	1 May 1997	Labour	Edgbaston	1997	date	14+
Shabana Mahmood	6 May 2010	Labour	Ladywood	2010	date	1+

Since 1945 there have been just two years when Brum had no women MPs (1951-52). For  1 (election) year, there were 5 women MPs and for the rest of 1992 to 2005 we had 4 women in office at a time. They were Jill, then Gisela alongside Clare, Estelle and Lynne.

The longest serving female MP in the city is Joan Christabel Knight, Baroness Knight of Collingtree, DBE (31 years) closely followed by Rt Hon Clare Short – 27 years.  Edgbaston has been served by women MPs continuously since 1953 – I wonder how many other constituencies in the land can claim the same. As of January 2012 there are two women serving.

A few held higher office:

• Clare Short wasSecretary of State for International Development in the Blair’s government from 3 May 1997 until her resignation from that post on 12 May 2003.
• Estelle Morris served as Secretary of State for Education and Skills in 2001. She was the first (former) comprehensive school teacher to have the position.
• Pitt had been Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Pensions from 1955 to 1959, and Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health from 1959 to 1962.
• Gisela Stewart was a junior health minister until 2001.

• Jill Knight, along with David Wilshire, was responsible for introducing the Section 28 amendment to the Local Government Act 1988, which barred local authorities from “promoting”homosexuality. She was also an opponent of abortion, and supported successive attempts to reduce the time-period when the operation could be legally performed.

More information about all these MPs (and the male ones too…) can be found at  http://www.theyworkforyou.com/.  All the dates information for this post came from here

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