Ann Clwyd | |
|---|---|
 Official portrait, 2017 | |
| Chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party | |
| In office 24 May 2005 – 5 December 2006 | |
| Leader | Tony Blair |
| Preceded by | Jean Corston |
| Succeeded by | Tony Lloyd |
| Shadow Secretary of State for National Heritage | |
| In office 29 September 1992 – 21 October 1993 | |
| Leader | John Smith |
| Preceded by | Bryan Gould |
| Succeeded by | Mo Mowlam |
| Shadow Secretary of State for Wales | |
| In office 18 July 1992 – 1 November 1992 | |
| Leader | John Smith |
| Preceded by | Barry Jones |
| Succeeded by | Ron Davies |
| Shadow Minister for Overseas Development | |
| In office 2 November 1989 – 18 July 1992 | |
| Leader | Neil Kinnock |
| Preceded by | Guy Barnett |
| Succeeded by | Michael Meacher |
| Member of Parliament forCynon Valley | |
| In office 3 May 1984 – 6 November 2019 | |
| Preceded by | Ioan Evans |
| Succeeded by | Beth Winter |
| Member of the European Parliament forMid and West Wales | |
| In office 7 June 1979 – 14 June 1984 | |
| Preceded by | Office created |
| Succeeded by | David Morris |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1937-03-21)21 March 1937 Halkyn, Flintshire, Wales |
| Died | 21 July 2023(2023-07-21) (aged 86) Cardiff, Wales |
| Political party | Welsh Labour |
| Spouse | |
| Alma mater | Bangor University[1] |
| Website | Welsh Labour |
Ann Clwyd Roberts (/ˈkluːɪd/KLOO-id,[2][3]Welsh:[ˈklʊɨd];née Ann Clwyd Lewis;[4] 21 March 1937 – 21 July 2023) was aWelsh Labour politician who served asMember of Parliament (MP) forCynon Valley for 35 years, from1984 until2019. Although she had intended to stand down in 2015, she was re-elected inthat year's general election and in2017 before standing down in 2019. Clwyd is the longest-serving female MP for a Welsh constituency.
Ann Clwyd was born inHalkyn,Flintshire,[citation needed] in 1937, the daughter of Gwilym Henri Lewis and Elizabeth Ann Lewis, born and brought up inPentre Halkyn, Flintshire.[5] She was educated at Halkyn Primary School,Holywell Grammar School and theQueen's School, Chester, before graduating from theUniversity of Wales, Bangor.[1]
Clwyd was a student teacher at Hope School in Flintshire, before training as a journalist. She then worked forBBC Wales as a studio manager, and then became Welsh correspondent for theGuardian andObserver newspapers during 1964–79.[1]
She was vice-chair of theArts Council of Wales from 1975 to 1979. She was a member of theNational Union of Journalists andTransport and General Workers' Union.[1]
Clwyd was persuaded to stand forParliament byHuw T. Edwards,[6] who felt that there should be more women in parliament.[citation needed] She was the unsuccessful Labour candidate inDenbigh in 1970 andGloucester in October 1974.[7]
From1979 to 1984, Clwyd was theMember of the European Parliament (MEP) forMid and West Wales.[1] She was elected to Parliament in aby-election in May 1984 following the death ofIoan Evans, and became the first woman to sit for aWelsh valleys constituency.[8] Her election came in the midst of the biggest industrial dispute since1926, which was the1984-85 coal miners' strike, in one of the mining constituencies most deeply affected. On her maiden speech on 7 June 1984, on the subject of the strike, she opened her remarks by saying "I am the new Member for Cynon Valley and will be the Member for a long time".[9] This prediction bore out correctly as she would serve the constituency for 35 years, and is one of the longest-serving MPs in recent history. Clwyd served asShadow Minister of Education and Women's Rights from 1987,[7] but was sacked in 1988 for rebelling against the party whip on further spending on nuclear weapons.[10] She returned asShadow Minister for Overseas Development from 1989 to 1992, and then served asShadow Secretary of State for Wales in 1992 and forNational Heritage from 1992 to 1993.[7]
In January 1993, Clwyd was rebuked by the Speaker of the House of CommonsBetty Boothroyd for parking her car in Speaker's Court, without permission. This culminated in Boothroyd threatening to have Clwyd's car clamped if she did it in future whereupon Clwyd desisted.[11][12]
Clwyd was theOpposition Spokesperson for Employment from 1993 to 1994, and for Foreign Affairs from 1994 to 1995,[7] when she was again sacked, along withJim Cousins, for observing the Turkish invasion of Iraqi Kirkuk without permission.[13] In 1994 she staged a sit-in downTower Colliery in her constituency to protest at its closure.[14] She was a member of theInternational Development Select Committee from 1997 to 2005.[7] On 9 August 2004, she became a member of thePrivy Council.[1]
Clwyd was a vice-chair of theParliamentary Labour Party from 2001 until 2005,[1] and was elected as chair by 167 to 156 (beatingTony Lloyd) on 24 May 2005. However, on 5 December 2006 she was defeated by Lloyd by 11 votes when she sought re-election, with her closeness to Tony Blair being cited as a reason for her defeat.[15]
During her parliamentary career, Clwyd served as Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Human Rights Group[1] and the All Party Parliamentary Iraq Group.[16] She was vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Coalfield Communities,[17] and Secretary of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Cambodia.[18] She was a former Chair of the British Group of theInter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), an Executive Member on the (IPU) Committee on Middle East Questions and an Executive Member on the (IPU) Coordinating Committee of Women Parliamentarians.[citation needed]
In February 2014, after informing party leaderEd Miliband of her decision at the monthly meeting of the Cynon Valley Labour Party, Clwyd announced that she was to stand down at the2015 general election.[14] However, she subsequently changed her mind but was told that she would need to go through a reselection process as the procedure to find her successor had already been put in train by the Labour Party.[19] On 13 December 2014, she was reselected from anall-women shortlist as the Labour Party candidate in Cynon Valley for the 2015 General Election.[20]
Clwyd was one of 13 MPs to vote against triggering the2017 General Election.[21]
In the series of Parliamentary votes on Brexit in March 2019, Clwyd voted against the Labour Party whip and in favour of an amendment tabled by members ofThe Independent Group for a second public vote.[22]
In September 2019, Clwyd announced again that she intended to retire at thenext general election.[23]
Through her interest in human rights and international women's rights, Clwyd became involved in the debate around the rule ofSaddam Hussein in Iraq. Whilst opposition spokesperson for Foreign Affairs, she was sacked along withJim Cousins for observing theTurkish Army's invasion of IraqiKirkuk without permission.[13] From 1997 to 2005 Clwyd was a member of theInternational Development Select Committee.[7]
On 12 March 2003, James Mahon made first mention of theclaims that some Iraqis were killed in plastic shredders orwoodchippers,[24][25] when he addressed the House of Commons after returning from research in northern Iraq. Six days later, Clwyd wrote an article inThe Times entitled "See men shredded, then say you don't back war," saying that an unnamed Iraqi had said that Saddam andQusay Hussein fed opponents of theirBaathist rule into a plastic shredder or woodchipper, and then used their shredded bodies as fish food.[26] Later she would add that it was believed to be housed inAbu Ghraib prison, and spoke with an unidentified person who claimed the American-sourced shredders were dismantled "just before the military got there".[27] As the first journalist to state the unsubstantiated claim, the rolling effect of the gruesome verbal picture garnered wider media and international political support, including from Australian Prime MinisterJohn Howard, for an invasion of Iraq.The Sun's political editorTrevor Kavanagh wrote in February 2004 that as a result of Clwyd's article "Public opinion swung behind Tony Blair, as voters learned how Saddam fed dissidents feet first into industrial shredders." As she had been vocal and prominent in her concern for the situation in Iraq before thewar,Tony Blair made her a Special Envoy on Human Rights in Iraq in the run-up to the war.[1]
At theChilcot Inquiry in February 2010, Clwyd explained why she supported the Iraq War. A month before the invasion, she had been on a visit toKurdistan collecting evidence regarding human rights abuses. There she found people living in fear of a repeat of the 1988Halabja massacre, where 5,000 Kurds had been killed in a gas attack. Whilst there she was taken by the wife of the [now]President of Iraq to the border of Iraq and Kurdistan, where she pointed towards the hillside and said: "That’s where they are going to fire the chemical weapons from."[28] On publication of the Chilcot report in July 2016, Clwyd remained unmoved: "So would I have still voted in Parliament in 2003 to support military action in Iraq – with the benefit of hindsight and in light of the Chilcot report? Yes. No one will ever be able to convince me that the world is not better off without Saddam Hussein and his Baathist regime in power."[29]
Clwyd was a member of theRoyal Commission on the National Health Service 1976–79.
In December 2012 Clwyd publicly criticised the standard of nursing care that her husband Owen Roberts had received at theUniversity Hospital of Wales when he was dying there in October 2012. She focussed on the lack of compassion shown to him.[30]
In 2013, following the Stafford Enquiry report, she was appointed by the Prime Minister to advise on complaint handling in the NHS.[31]
In 2003, Clwyd was chosen for a place to introduce aPrivate member's bill via a ballot of MPs. She was pressed by hundreds of pressure groups[citation needed] who wished to publicise their own groups, and promote their own proposals for legislation. She chose to introduce the Female Genital Mutilation Bill (to prohibit parents from sending, or taking, their daughters abroad for operations such as female circumcision),[32] which was successfully enacted.[33] Female circumcision itself had already been banned in 1985.[34]
Clwyd was admitted to the White Robe of the Gorsedd of Bards at theNational Eisteddfod of Wales in 1991. She was an Honorary Fellow of theUniversity of Wales, Bangor, and theNorth East Wales Institute of Higher Education, which awarded her a University of Wales honorary degree. She held an HonoraryDoctorate of Laws fromTrinity College, Carmarthen for her contribution to politics and as a human rights campaigner. She was a Member of theArts Council 1975–1979 and the Vice Chair of the Welsh Arts Council 1975–97.
In 1963, Ann Clwyd married Owen Dryhurst Roberts, a television director and producer. He died in October 2012, at the age of 73.
Clwyd died at her home inCardiff on 21 July 2023, at the age of 86.[35]
| European Parliament | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by (new post) | Member of the European Parliament forMid and West Wales 1979–1984 | Succeeded by |
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
| Preceded by | Member of Parliament forCynon Valley 1984–2019 | Succeeded by |
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party 2005–2006 | Succeeded by |
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| People | |
| Other | |
