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Ann Widdecombe

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Ann Noreen Widdecombe (born October 4, 1947) is a British Conservative Party politician. She is the Member of Parliament for Maidstone and The Weald, a Privy Counsellor, and an outspoken supporter of traditional family values. She read Latin at Birmingham University and later attended Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford to read PPE.

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[edit] Political career

From 1976 to 1978, Widdecombe was a Runnymede District Councillor. She contested the seat of Burnley in 1979, and then Plymouth Devonport in 1983 against David Owen. She was first elected to the House of Commons in the 1987 UK general election as member for the constituency of Maidstone (which became Maidstone and The Weald in 1997).

Widdecombe joined John Major's government as Parliamentary Under-secretary of State for Social Security in 1991. After the 1992 general election, she became the Home Office Minister in Charge of Prisons, and in that role visited every single prison. After the fall of the Conservative government to Labour in 1997 she served as shadow Health Secretary and later shadow Home Secretary under William Hague.

During the 2001 Conservative leadership election, she could not find sufficient Conservative MPs to support her as a leadership candidate. She first supported Michael Ancram, who was eliminated in the first round, and then Kenneth Clarke, who lost in the final round. She afterwards declined to serve in an Iain Duncan Smith shadow cabinet (although she indicated prior to the leadership contest that she wished to retire to the backbenches anyway).

In the 2005 leadership election, she initially supported Kenneth Clarke again. Once he was eliminated, she turned support towards Liam Fox. Following Fox's subsequent elimination, she took time to reflect before finally declaring for David Davis. It is notable that she expressed reservations over the eventual winner David Cameron, feeling that he did not have a proven track record like the other candidates for leadership, and she has been a leading figure in parliamentary opposition to his A List policy which she has said is "an insult to women" [1]. She is apparently reconsidering standing at the next General Election so as to thwart any attempt to put someone from the A List in her constituency.

In an interview with The Metro in September 2006 she announced that if the parliament is of a normal length it was likely she would go at the next General Election <ref>http://www.metro.co.uk/fame/interviews/article.html?in_article_id=19578&in_page_id=11</ref>.

At the October 2006 Conservative Conference, she was Chief Dragon in a political version of Dragon's Den, in which A-list candidates were invited to put forward a policy proposal which was then torn apart by her team of Rachel Elnaugh, Oliver Letwin and Michael Brown [2].

[edit] Political views

Widdecombe is known for her outspoken views concerning abortion and recreational drugs. She called for a zero tolerance policy of prosecution for users of cannabis in her speech at the 2000 Conservative conference, which was well-received by rank-and-file Conservative delegates. However, she alleges that someone connected with Francis Maude promptly contacted journalists to alert them that fellow Conservative cabinet members were prepared to come out and indicate "something of ambivalence" towards their own past experiences with this drug.

In 2003, together with fellow Roman Catholic MP Edward Leigh, Widdecombe proposed an amendment opposing repeal of Section 28 of the Local Government Act, which banned the promotion of the acceptability of homosexuality.

She is a committed animal lover and one of the few Conservative MPs to consistently vote in favour of the ban on fox hunting.

[edit] Controversies

Widdecombe has occasionally stirred up controversy with her words and policies. When the voters of Eastbourne returned a Liberal Democrat candidate, in the by-election caused by the assassination of Ian Gow, Widdecombe told them "the IRA would be toasting their success".

She also made headlines for her policy of applying the standards for handcuffing prisoners in transit to pregnant women, even on visits to hospitals. Widdecombe claimed that this was necessary because of the risk of their absconding.

During the Conservative leadership election that picked William Hague, Widdecombe spoke out against Michael Howard, under whom she had served when he was Home Secretary. She remarked "there is something of the night about him", and it is for this remark she is probably most famous or infamous. It was considered to be extremely damaging, and Howard was frequently portrayed as a vampire in satire from that time on, [3] and came last in the poll. However, he went on to become party leader in 2003, and Ann Widdecombe said "I explained fully what my objections were in 1997 and I do not retract anything I said then. But this is 2005 and we have to look to the future and not the past." [4]

[edit] Trivia

Along with John Gummer MP, she converted to Roman Catholicism in 1993, in the wake of the decision to ordain women into the Church of England [5].

Widdecombe is famous for being open upon the subject of her celibacy.

Her fellow Conservative MPs and political opponents have been cruel at times about her appearance, dubbing her "Doris Karloff" in reference to horror film actor Boris Karloff.

During the 2001 UK general election, I Love Ann Widdecombe underwear was the top-selling item at Politico's Bookstore, a London shop devoted to political merchandise.

Her non-political accomplishments include being a popular novelist. In 2002, she took part in the ITV programme Celebrity Fit Club. In March of 2004 she briefly became the Guardian newspaper's agony aunt, introduced with an Emma Brockes interview [6]. In 2005 BBC Two showed six episodes of The Widdecombe Project, an agony aunt television programme. In 2005, she appeared in a new series of Celebrity Fit Club, but this time as a panel member dispensing wisdom and advice to the celebrities taking part. Also in 2005, she presented a show Ann Widdecombe to the Rescue in which she acted as an agony aunt, dispensing no-nonsense advice to disputing families, couples, and others across the UK.

In 2006 she launched a boycott against British Airways for suspending a worker who refused to hide her cross.

In November 2006 she moved into the house of an Islington Labour Councillor to experience life on a Council Estate, her response to her experience being "Five years ago I made a speech in the House of Commons about the forgotten decents. I have spent the last week on estates in the Islington area finding out that they are still forgotten" <ref>Anne gets taste of council estate life. Islington Gazette (22 November 2006). Retrieved on 2006-11-28.</ref>.

[edit] Bibliography

  • An Act of Peace by Ann Widdecombe (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2005) ISBN 0-297-82958-0
  • An Act of Treachery by Ann Widdecombe (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2002) ISBN 0-297-64573-0
  • The Clematis Tree by Ann Widdecombe (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2000) ISBN 0-297-64572-2
  • Ann Widdecombe: Right from the Beginning by Nicholas Kochan (Politico's Publishing, 2000) ISBN 1-902301-55-2
  • Inspired and Outspoken: The Collected Speeches of Ann Widdecombe edited by John Simmons (Politico's Publishing, 1999) ISBN 1-902301-22-6

[edit] References

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[edit] External links

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by:
John Wells 		Member of Parliament for Maidstone
1987–1997 		Succeeded by:
(constituency abolished)
Preceded by:
(new constituency) 		Member of Parliament for
Maidstone and The Weald
1997 – present 		Incumbent
sco:Ann Widdecombe

sv:Ann Widdecombe

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