Barbara Follett is a British Labour Party politician who served as the Member of Parliament for Stevenage from 1997 until 2010. During this time, she held several parliamentary and ministerial positions. In the decade before entering Parliament she played a major part in transformation of the Labour Party, firstly by making members more aware of their visual impact on voters and secondly by co-founding and running two organisations, Labour Women's Network and Emily's List UK, which spearheaded reforms that helped Labour to return a record 101 women to Parliament in 1997.

 

The 1997 General Election saw Barbara elected as the MP for Stevenage. In Parliament she went on the Select Committee on International Development, as well as becoming Chair of the All-Party Retail Industry Group; Chair of the Eastern Group of Labour MPS; Chair of the Eastern Region of Labour Movement in Europe; Vice-Chair of the Parliamentary Film Industries Group; a member of Labour’s backbench Treasury Committee; Joint Secretary of the Population, Development and Reproductive Health Group; and Treasurer of the Sex Equality Group. She is also a member of the Fabian Society.

 

In May 1999, Barbara became a member of the Britain in Europe Council, and served on the Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons. In June 2005, she was elected as Chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) Women’s Committee. In November 2005, she became Parliamentary Private Secretary to Tessa Jowell.

 

In June 2007 she was appointed to become Minister for the East of England, and, in October 2007, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of Equality, supporting the Minister for Women and Equalities, Harriet Harman, with a particular role in drafting the government’s equality legislation. She then went on to serve as Minister for Culture, Tourism and the Creative Industries between October 2008 and September 2009, before finally serving as Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Department for Communities and Local Government until May 2010.

 

Election results since 1997