Judith Hart

Constance Mary Hart, Baroness Hart of South Lanark, DBE, PC (née Ridehalgh; 18 September 1924 – 8 December 1991), known as Judith Hart, was a British Labour Party politician. She served as a government minister during the 1960s and 1970s before entering the House of Lords in 1988.

She was educated at Clitheroe Royal Grammar School, the London School of Economics and the University of London. She adopted the name Judith aged twelve. She married Anthony Bernard Hart in 1946. She was a lecturer at a teacher training college. She was a member of the Fabian Society and a branch secretary of the Association of Scientific Workers.

After joining the Labour Party aged 18, Hart was unsuccessful Labour candidate for Bournemouth West in 1951, and Aberdeen South in 1955. She was elected as member for Lanark in 1959, holding the seat until 1983. Thereafter she sat for Clydesdale until 1987.

She held ministerial office as joint Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland from 1964 to 1966, Minister of State, Commonwealth Office (1966–1967), Minister of Social Security (1967–68), Paymaster-General (with a seat in the Cabinet) from 1968 to 1969, and as Minister of Overseas Development from 1969–70, 1974–75 and 1977-79. In so doing, she became the fifth woman ever to have been included in a government cabinet in the history of Britain.

In opposition, Hart was front bench spokesman on overseas aid from 1979 to 1980. Govt Co-Chairman of the Women's National Commission, 1969-70. Within the Labour Party she was a member of the National Executive Committee (1969–83), serving as Vice-Chairman from 1980–81, and as Chairman from 1981-82.

She was appointed a Privy Counsellor in 1967 and appointed a DBE in 1979.

On 8 February 1988, she was created a life peer, as Baroness Hart of South Lanark, of Lanark in the County of Lanark.

She died of cancer at the Queen Mary's Hospital, Roehampton, London, in 1991, aged 67.

• Miss Judith Ridehalgh (1936–1946)
• Mrs Judith Hart (1946–1959)
• Judith Hart MP (1959–1967)
• The Rt. Hon. Judith Hart MP (1967–1979)
• The Rt. Hon. Dame Judith Hart DBE MP (1979–1988)
• The Rt. Hon. The Baroness Hart of South Lanark DBE PC (1988–1991)