This article is from the January issue of Total Politics
Having been chairwoman of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), investigated by MI5, and suspected of being a communist sympathiser, it must have been quite something to arrive at the heart of establishment.
I was advised by members of the CND that I would have far greater power if I stayed within an extra-parliamentary campaign than I would if I arrived in Parliament. That was my challenge, to make Parliament a place where I could achieve things. I’d always believed in the parliamentary system.
You were also an energy minister, which must have been interesting for someone who’d come, pre-Parliament, from the CND.
Yes. That was the most wonderful job I’ve had in my life, I have to say. I’m originally a scientist, which was an enormous help, because I could always understand all of my briefs. Some of the things I was dealing with were very tough indeed, but it was a job I loved. I travelled all over the world, meeting other ministers, trying to push forward the climate change agenda.
How did you feel entering into politics when you had a female prime minister, but one whose politics were very different from yours?
No one can take away from the fact – and I certainly wouldn’t – that Margaret Thatcher broke through the glass ceiling, but she was not a feminist and she was not a sister. She was a woman who didn’t seek either to advance women within her own circle or to advance the position of women within society.
As the first minister for women, what do you think you were able to achieve?
The enduring thing that we achieved was the absolute key aims that we had. One was to improve childcare. Another was to take action on violence against women and also to look at the representation of women. In all of those areas, we set a benchmark, and employed and set up what is now the equalities unit. When Harriet Harman and I were thrown out of government, we continued to fight to make sure that unit, and those strategies, were continued as far as possible. Ours was not a popular brief. People thought we were a waste of space, politically correct or strident, but everything we said in those days has been taken up in different forms. Now, though, there are setbacks. We know that women are suffering the worst from all the economic changes that are happening, that they are particularly disadvantaged. It demonstrates that, sadly, the equalities agenda is not being pursued now with the same vigour.
Do you still believe Parliament is the place to achieve things?
Yes. When you’re in government there’s a tremendous sense that you can do things, you can really achieve. Being in government is an enormous privilege, and a really tremendous thing to have done. When you’re an old hand like me, you feel more of the frustration than the achievement, but where else would I be able to make the views of my constituents known other than in this place?
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