Margaret Jay, Baroness Jay of Paddington
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Margaret Jay, Baroness Jay of Paddington, PC (born 1940) is a British politician for the Labour Party.
Her father was former Labour Prime Minister James Callaghan, and she was educated at Blackheath High School and Somerville College, Oxford.
Between 1965 and 1977 she held production posts within the BBC, working on current affairs and further education television programmes. She then became a journalist on the BBC's prestigious Panorama programme, and Thames Television's This Week. She went on to present the BBC 2 series, Social History of Medicine, as well as being a contributor to Newsnight, Any Questions, Question Time and other current affairs programmes.
She has a strong interest in health issues, notably as a campaigner on HIV and AIDS. She was a founder director of the National Aids Trust in 1987. She is also a patron of Help the Aged.
She was appointed a life peer in 1992 with the title of Baroness Jay of Paddington, of Paddington in the City of Westminster, and acted as an opposition Whip in the House of Lords. In association with the shop workers' union, she led opposition to the liberalisation of Sunday trading hours.
After her party's election victory in 1997, she became Health Spokesman and Minister for Women in the House of Lords. From 1998 she was Leader of the House of Lords, playing a pivotal role in the major reform that led to the removal of most of its hereditary members. She retired from active politics in 2001. Among numerous non-executive roles that she has taken on since retiring from politics, she is a non-executive director of BT Group. [1]
Her personal life is as remarkable as her professional life. In 1969 she married fellow-journalist, Peter Jay, who was later appointed ambassador to the United States of America by Dr. David Owen, Foreign Secretary in Callaghan's government. While in the USA, she met journalist Carl Bernstein, with whom she had a much-publicised relationship in 1979 -- with the result that she was unflatteringly depicted in a novel by Bernstein's wife, Nora Ephron, called Heartburn, and subsequent film of the same name. Her husband had an equally noted affair with their nanny. Peter and Margaret were divorced in 1986 after eighteen years of marriage and she lived for awhile with Professor Robert Neild, the Cambridge economist. In 1994 she married AIDS specialist Professor Michael Adler who had been chair of the National Aids Trust when she was its director, during which period he was married to Karen Dunnell.
She has three children: Tamsin, Alice and Patrick.
| Preceded by: The Lord Richard |
Leader of the House of Lords 1998–2001 |
Followed by: The Lord Williams of Mostyn |
| Lord Privy Seal 1998–2001 |
