The Peerage Act 1963 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that permits female hereditary peers and all Scottish hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords and allows newly inherited hereditary peerages to be disclaimed.
Betty Boothroyd,Baroness Boothroyd,was a British politician who served as a member of Parliament (MP) for West Bromwich and West Bromwich West from 1973 to 2000. A member of the Labour Party,she served as Speaker of the House of Commons from 1992 to 2000. She was previously a Deputy Speaker from 1987 to 1992. She was the first and to date only woman to serve as Speaker. Boothroyd later sat in the House of Lords as,in accordance with tradition,a crossbench peer.
Alan James Beith,Baron Beith,is a British Liberal Democrat politician who represented Berwick-upon-Tweed as its Member of Parliament (MP) from 1973 to 2015.
Winifred Ann Taylor,Baroness Taylor of Bolton,is a British politician and life peer who served in the Cabinet of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2001. A member of the Labour Party,she was Member of Parliament (MP) for Bolton West from 1974 to 1983,and Dewsbury from 1987 to 2005.
Rosalie Winterton,Baroness Winterton of Doncaster,,is a British Labour Party politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Doncaster Central from 1997 to 2024. She served as a Deputy Speaker in the House of Commons from 2017 to 2024. She became a member of the House of Lords in 2024.
Eleanor Fulton Laing,Baroness Laing of Elderslie,,is a British Conservative Party politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Epping Forest from 1997 to 2024. She served in the shadow cabinets of Michael Howard and David Cameron. From 2013 to 2024,Laing was a Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons and was the first female Chairman of Ways and Means from 2020 to 2024. She had one of the longest tenures in the speaker's chair. She became a member of the House of Lords in 2024.
Dame Siobhain Ann McDonagh is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Mitcham and Morden since 1997. She served as an Assistant Whip in the Labour Government,but was dismissed following comments regarding a leadership contest to replace prime minister Gordon Brown.
Helene Valerie Hayman,Baroness Hayman,is a British politician who was Lord Speaker of the House of Lords in the Parliament of the United Kingdom. As a member of the Labour Party she was a Member of Parliament from 1974 to 1979. When she became an MP at age 25,she was the youngest MP of the 1974–79 Parliament. Hayman became a life peer in 1996.
Janet Ray Michie,Baroness Michie of Gallanach was a Scottish speech therapist and Liberal Democrat politician. She served as the Member of Parliament for Argyll and Bute for fourteen years,from 1987-2001,and then became a life peer in the House of Lords. She was the first peer to pledge the oath of allegiance in the House of Lords in Gaelic.
Humphrey Edward Gregory Atkins,Baron Colnbrook,was a British politician and a member of the Conservative Party. He served for 32 years as a Member of Parliament (MP),and served in the Cabinet of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher from 1979 to 1982.
Joan Helen Vickers,Baroness Vickers,DBE was a British National Liberal and later Conservative Party politician. She was the MP for Plymouth Devonport from 1955 to 1974.
Bryan Davies,Baron Davies of Oldham,PC is a Labour politician and former member of the House of Commons and House of Lords. He served as Government Deputy Chief Whip in the House of Lords from 2003 to 2010,and as usual for a holder of that position,also held the position of Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard.
Mitcham and Morden is a constituency in Greater London represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 1997 by Dame Siobhain McDonagh of the Labour Party.
Priscilla Jean Fortescue Buchan,Baroness Tweedsmuir of Belhelvie,styled as Priscilla,Lady Grant between 1934 and 1944,and as Lady Tweedsmuir between 1948 and 1970,was a Unionist and Conservative politician.
Eirene Lloyd White,Baroness White was a British Labour politician and journalist.
Plymouth Drake was a borough constituency in the city of Plymouth,in Devon. It elected one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom by the first past the post system of election.
Beatrice Serota,Baroness Serota,DBE was a British Government minister and a Deputy Speaker of the House of Lords.
The 1997 Prime Minister's Resignation Honours were officially announced in two supplements to The London Gazette of 1 August 1997 and marked the May 1997 resignation of the Prime Minister,John Major.
The representation of women in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom has been an issue in the politics of the United Kingdom at numerous points in the 20th and 21st centuries. Originally debate centred on whether women should be allowed to vote and stand for election as Members of Parliament. The Parliament Act 1918 gave women over 21 the right to stand for election as a Member of Parliament. The United Kingdom has had three female Prime Ministers:Margaret Thatcher (1979–1990),Theresa May (2016–2019),and Liz Truss (2022). The publication of the book Women in the House by Elizabeth Vallance in 1979 highlighted the under-representation of women in Parliament. In more modern times concerns about the under-representation of women led the Labour Party to introduce and,decades later,abandon all-women short lists,something which was later held to breach discrimination laws.
