Margaret Beckett
Dame Margaret Mary Beckett GBE (née Jackson; born 15 January 1943) is a British former politician who was Britain's first female Foreign Secretary and a minister under Prime Ministers Wilson, Callaghan, Blair and Brown. Beckett was Deputy Leader of the Opposition and Deputy Leader of the Labour Party from 1992 to 1994, and briefly Leader of the Opposition and acting Leader of the Labour Party following John Smith's death in 1994. A member of the Labour Party, she served as a Member of Parliament (MP) for Lincoln from 1974 to 1979 and for Derby South from 1983 to 2024. Her 45 years tenure makes her the longest-serving female MP in British history.
The Right Honourable DameMargaret Beckett
Tony Blair
David Miliband
Tony Blair
Nick Brown
Herself[c]
Tony Blair
Tony Blair
Tony Blair
John Smith
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Beckett was first elected to Parliament at the October 1974 general election for Lincoln and held junior positions in the governments of Harold Wilson and James Callaghan. She lost her seat at the 1979 election, but returned to the House of Commons in 1983, this time representing Derby South. She was appointed to Neil Kinnock's Shadow Cabinet shortly afterward; she was elected Deputy Leader of the Labour Party in 1992, becoming the first woman to hold that role. When John Smith died in 1994, Beckett became the first woman to lead the Labour Party, although Tony Blair won the election to replace Smith shortly afterward and assumed the substantive leadership.
After Labour returned to power in 1997, Beckett became a member of Tony Blair's Cabinet initially as President of the Board of Trade. She later served as Leader of the House of Commons and Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, before becoming Foreign Secretary in 2006, the first woman to hold that position, and—after Margaret Thatcher—the second woman to hold one of the Great Offices of State. Following Blair's resignation as Prime Minister in 2007, Beckett was not initially given a position by new Prime Minister Gordon Brown; after she had spent a period on the backbenches, Brown appointed her to his cabinet as Minister of State for Housing and Planning in 2008, before she left the government for the last time in 2009.
Beckett holds the record for the female MP with the longest service overall (Harriet Harman has longer continuous service) and, was the last remaining MP who served in the Labour governments of the 1970s. On 26 March 2022 Beckett announced that she would stand down at the next general election.[1]
Early life[edit]
Margaret Beckett was born Margaret Mary Jackson in 1943, in Ashton-under-Lyne, Lancashire, into the family of a disabled Congregationalist carpenter father and an Irish Catholic teacher mother. Her father died early, precipitating family poverty.[2] She had two sisters, one later a nun, the other later a doctor and mother of three. She was educated at the Notre Dame High School for Girls in Norwich, then at University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology, where she took a degree in metallurgy.[3] She was an active member of the Students' Union and served on its council.
In 1961, Beckett joined Associated Electrical Industries as a student apprentice in metallurgy. She joined the Transport and General Workers Union in 1964. She joined the University of Manchester in 1966 as an experiment officer in its metallurgy department, and in 1970 went to work for the Labour Party as a researcher in industrial policy.
Honours[edit]
Beckett was appointed to the Privy Council in 1993, giving her the honorific title "The Right Honourable" for life.
She was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2013 New Year Honours for public and political service[56][57] and Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire (GBE) in the 2024 New Year Honours for parliamentary, political and public service.[58]
In November 2017 she was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of the University (D.Univ) from the University of Derby.[59]
Personal life[edit]
She married the chairman of her local Constituency Labour Party, Lionel "Leo" Beckett, in August 1979.[11][60][61] Beckett employed her husband as her office manager, on a salary up to £30,000.[62] The practice of MPs employing family members has been criticised by some sections of the media on the lines that it promotes nepotism.[63][64] Although MPs who were first elected in 2017 have been banned from employing family members, the restriction is not retroactive.[65]
Leo Beckett had two sons from a previous marriage, and three grandchildren. Beckett and her husband enjoyed caravan holidays [66] throughout her political career.[67] Leo Beckett died in 2021.[68]