Virginia Bottomley

Virginia Hilda Brunette Maxwell Bottomley, Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone, (née Garnett; born 12 March 1948) is a British Conservative Party politician and headhunter. She was a Member of Parliament (MP) in the House of Commons from 1984 to 2005. She became a member of the House of Lords in 2005.

Early life and career

Virginia Hilda Brunette Maxwell Garnett was born in Dunoon, Scotland, to Barbara Rutherford-Smith, Jarrow hunger marcher, a teacher and elected Conservative member of the Inner London Education Authority and W. John Garnett CBE, former director of what was then called The Industrial Society, grandson of Cambridge physicist and educational adviser William Garnett and of Sir Edward Poulton, Hope professor of zoology at Oxford.^[2][3] Her paternal aunt was Labour Greater London Council member Peggy Jay. She met Peter Bottomley, her future husband, when she was 12 years old; they wed seven years later In 1967.

Bottomley was at Putney High School, in southwest London, before studying sociology at the University of Essex. She graduated again MSc at the London School of Economics.

She began her working life as a social scientist and was a researcher for the Child Poverty Action Group.^[4] She was a psychiatric social worker with the Institute of Psychiatry, a magistrate (Justice of the Peace), and she chaired an Inner London Juvenile Court.^[5]

Member of Parliament and in government

After unsuccessfully contesting the Isle of Wight in the 1983 general election (34,904 votes), she was elected to Parliament with 21,545 votes in a by-election in 1984 (filling the seat left vacant by the death of Maurice Macmillan, son of former prime minister Harold Macmillan),^[6] as the Member for South West Surrey. She was PPS to Chris Patten and then to Foreign Secretary Sir Geoffrey Howe. She received her first ministerial position in 1988 as a Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Department of the Environment^[7][8] and was appointed Minister of State at the Department of Health in 1989.^[8] She was appointed a member of the Privy Council (PC) upon joining John Major's Cabinet as Secretary of State for Health in 1992,^[9][10] becoming the ninth woman to serve in the British cabinet.^[11] She served as Health Secretary until 1995.^[12]

Bottomley and Ann Widdecombe have been listed as co-founders of Lady Olga Maitland's pro-nuclear Women and Families for Defence group.^[13]

She served as Secretary of State for National Heritage from 1995 to 1997.^[10][14] During this period, she appeared in the Eurovision Song Contest 1996, wishing luck to the United Kingdom's entrant, Gina G, in her postcard.^[15]

After the 1997 general election, she returned to the backbenches, and became a headhunter at Odgers, where she headed and now chairs the company's Board & CEO Practice.^[16]

Retirement

She stepped down from the House of Commons when the 2005 general election was called.^[6] On 24 June 2005 she was created a life peer with the title Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone, of St Helens in the County of Isle of Wight,^[10][17] the parish where she was baptised and celebrated her marriage.

Personal life

Bottomley is involved with charitable and academic bodies in addition to business. She was on the founding Council of the University of the Arts, London. She was a Council Member of the Ditchley Foundation and was President of Farnham Castle, Centre for International Briefing. From 2000 until May 2012 she sat on the Supervisory Board of Akzo Nobel, taking over Courtaulds and then ICI. She was a non-executive director of Bupa, a healthcare company. She was on the Advisory Council of the International Chamber of Commerce UK (ICC UK) and the Judge School of Management, Cambridge. Bottomley has been a trustee and is a fellow of the Industry and Parliament Trust. She was National President of the Abbeyfield Society^[18] and a Vice-Patron of Carers and of Cruse Bereavement Care. She was a lay canon of Guildford Cathedral, and a Freeman of the City of London.

In 2006, she was elected and installed as Chancellor of the University of Hull, succeeding Lord Armstrong of Ilminster in April 2006.^[19] She was also appointed a Deputy Lieutenant of Surrey on 22 March of that year and Sheriff of Hull since 2013.^[20][21] She is the longest serving trustee of The Economist newspaper.^[22]

Virginia Garnett married Peter Bottomley in 1967, after the birth of their eldest child;^[23][24] he was an MP from 1975 until 2024.^[25]

During her time in Prime Minister John Major's cabinet, the satirical puppet show Spitting Image often portrayed Major as having an unrequited crush on Bottomley.^[26]

Bottomley's family includes many figures in politics and public life. Her brother, Christopher Garnett, was the chief executive of train operating company GNER.^[27] Her aunt Pauline married Roland Hunt (who is not connected to Sir Nicholas Hunt, father of Jeremy Hunt who succeeded her as MP).^{[citation needed]}

Her cousins include Peter Jay (the former British Ambassador to the United States^[28] and son-in-law to James Callaghan), and Lord Hunt of Chesterton (father of historian and former Labour MP Tristram Hunt).

More distant relatives include Lord Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay^[28] and Baron Jay of Ewelme (former FCO PUSS and British Ambassador to France).

Julia Cleverdon married Bottomley's late father, John.^[29] Her husband's niece is Kitty Ussher (a former Labour minister).^[30]

References

1. ^ "Mrs Virginia Bottomley (Hansard)". api.parliament.uk. Retrieved 1 January 2020.
2. ^ "Obituary: John Garnett". The Independent. 18 September 1997. Archived 27 June 2019 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 27 June 2019.
3. ^ "The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography". 2004. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/33333. ISBN 978-0-19-861412-8. Archived from the original on 30 April 2018. Retrieved 29 April 2018.
4. ^ "Poor families 'can expect little help with food bills'". No. 58331. 22 November 1971. p. 3.
5. ^ Whitehead, Peter (1 December 2010). "Interview: A discreet new life away from the spotlight". Financial Times. Retrieved 16 March 2023.
6. ^ "Looking back on 21 years as an MP". BBC. 27 April 2005. Archived 7 April 2014 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 22 February 2010.
7. ^ Geoffrey Parkhouse (26 July 1988). "Thatcher surprise shake-up for Health". The Glasgow Herald. p. 1. Archived 5 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 22 February 2010.
8. ^ "Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone". www.parliament.uk. Archived from the original on 18 June 2012. Retrieved 4 March 2012.
9. ^ William E. Schmidt (12 April 1992). "In London's Shock, A Cabinet Is Named". New York Times. Archived 31 May 2013 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 22 February 2010.
10. ^
11. ^ Mikhailova, Anna (23 December 2019). "Sir Peter Bottomley, the new Father of the House: 'Each department I was in, I would say - you have at least one minister too many'". The Telegraph. Retrieved 16 March 2023.
12. ^ "Care in the community failures". BBC News. 20 November 1998.
13. ^ Martin, Lorna (19 August 2006). "The battle of Greenham Common is over. But their spirit still burns". The Guardian
14. ^ Alberge, Dalya (7 July 1995). "Bottomley keen to join her 'Ministry of the Future'". No. 65313. p. 9.
15. ^ Hall, James 21 May 2021. "Just a Little Bit... crooked: How Gina G's Ooh Aah Eurovision glory was stolen". The Telegraph. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
16. ^ "Virginia Bottomley". Odgers Berndtson. Retrieved 25 January 2022.
17. ^ No. 57688. 29 June 2005. p. 8439.
18. ^ "Abbeyfield Society: Patrons". Archived from the original on 7 July 2011. Retrieved 4 September 2009.
19. ^ "Ex-Minister is new Uni Chancellor". BBC News. 26 January 2006. Retrieved 16 March 2023.
20. ^ "Deputy Lieutenant Commissions Lieutenancy of Surrey 22 March 2006". The London Gazette. Retrieved 16 November 2023.
21. ^ BBC Lord Mandelson picked for High Steward of Hull post Archived 13 December 2019 at the Wayback Machine, 7 February 2013; accessed 21 March 2014.
22. ^ "Our Trustees". The Economist Group. Retrieved 16 March 2023.
23. ^ Durham, Michael (12 July 1992). "Virginia's early summer of love, books and a baby". The Independent. Archived 11 September 2016 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 29 October 2017.
24. ^ "Biography at John Major site". Archived from the original on 30 August 2010. Retrieved 9 September 2010.
25. ^
26. ^ Billen, Andrew (28 March 2008). "An entire political era was covered in rubber by Spitting Image". The Times. No. 69283. p. 11. Archived 13 September 2018 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 13 September 2018.
27. ^ Harper, Keith (21 July 2001). "Profile: Christopher Garnett". The Guardian. Retrieved 16 March 2023.
28. ^ Moya, Elena (2010). "Big-name hunter Virginia Bottomley fights to bag more jobs for women". The Guardian. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
29. ^ Davidson, Andrew (2007), "The MT interview: Julia Cleverdon" Archived 4 March 2012 at the Wayback Machine, Management Today, 28 September 2007; retrieved 3 January 2011.
30. ^ "She fought for the euro; now one of Brown's stars will be the City's champion". EMAG/The Times. 9 July 2007. Archived 4 October 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 18 June 2009.

External links

• Debrett's People of Today

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