My tribute to Shirley Williams

Shirley Williams, latterly Baroness Williams of Crosby, passed away yesterday.

Shirley, Education Secretary from 1976-79 and Minister of State for Education & Science from 1967-69 (she held other posts, but these are the two where her impact was the most significant), was most famous for being one of the Gang of Four who founded the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in 1981, alongside Roy Jenkins, David Owen, and Bill Rodgers. The daughter of political philosopher George Catlin and the famous writer Vera Britten (who incidentally was born in Newcastle under Lyme, not far from Keele University where I obtained my master's degree), Shirley first became a Labour MP in 1964 for Hitchin, which at the time included Stevenage as well as the entirety of the current North Hertfordshire district in which I live, and her moderate style suited the constituency very well indeed. Her brief time as Labour MP for Hertford & Stevenage marks the only time my hometown of Ware, along with its larger neighbour, Hertford has ever had a Labour MP. (Hertford and Ware became part of the rock-solid Conservative seat of Hertford & Stortford in 1983, where they remain today; in a direct nod to Shirley's moderate stance, the SDP only missed out on winning Stevenage by 1,582 votes in 1983) During her brief tenure in Hertford & Stevenage, Shirley pushed through an expansion of comprehensive education to replace elitist grammar schools as much as possible, a move marred by her decision to enrol her daughter in a school that later chose to become an elite private school, not to mention cuts to education funding and greater centralisation of education by successive governments.

After losing her seat in 1979, she famously won Crosby, one of the safest Conservative seats north of the Mersey, in a 1981 by-election for the SDP, compensating for Roy Jenkins' narrow failure in Warrington earlier that year. This spectacular win combined with her determination to break the mould of politics culminated in the SDP-Liberal Alliance leading in the polls for months, although after the Falklands War the SDP-Liberal Alliance lost momentum and eventually came third in 1983, despite Labour losing so many voters. Shirley herself lost Crosby that year by 3,401 votes. She made a permanent mark on the seat, though: Labour eventually gained it in 1997 (even that year they did not expect to win Crosby), helped by the gradual desertion of Conservative voters in Merseyside, and both it and its successor, Sefton Central, have been in Labour hands ever since. 

Her most significant impact on politics, apart from wedging a large crack in the two-party system, was helping more women in politics push to the forefront and above the parapet. Both of these indirectly paved the way for breakthroughs by the Green Party, starting from the 1989 European elections, and for more people with protected characteristics rising to prominence in politics.

So farewell, Shirley Williams. You may have been a Labour MP and later a Liberal Democrat peer, but you have left an imprint for progressive politics in general that will always be remembered across the political spectrum.

Shirley Vivienne Teresa Britten Williams, born 27 July 1930, departed this life on 12 April 2021, aged 90 years.



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