Lena Jeger, Baroness Jeger

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Lena May Jeger, Baroness Jeger (19 November 1915 - 26 February 2007) was a British Labour politician. She was an MP for 21 years, in two spells. She followed her husband as Member of Parliament for Holborn and St Pancras South, holding the seat from 1953 to 1959. She retook the seat in 1964, retaining it until 1979, when she became a life peer.

[edit] Early life

She was born Lena May Chivers in Yorkley, Gloucestershire. Her father was a postman. She was educated at Southgate County School in north London, and read English and French at Birkbeck College, University of London. She was vice-president of the National Union of Students. She joined the Civil Service in 1936, initially in HM Customs & Excise.

During World War II, she worked at the Ministry of Information and the Foreign Office. A fluent Russian speaker, she edited the British Ally, a newspaper published by the British government in the Soviet Union. She also worked at the British Embassy in Moscow. In 1948, she married general practitioner Dr Santo Jeger, who had been Member of Parliament for St Pancras South-East since the 1945 UK general election.

She left the civil service in 1949, and worked for The Manchester Guardian from 1951 to 1954.

[edit] Political career

Jeger was elected to the St. Pancras Borough Council (1945-59) and the London County Council (1952-1955). Her husband died in 1953 and she was selected to fight the by-election in his seat in Holborn and St Pancras South. She won the by-election, held on her birthday, by 1,976 votes, slightly increasing the Labour majority, and just retained her seat at the 1955 general election by 931 votes. She lost the seat to the Conservatives in the 1959 general election by 656 votes, losing to Geoffrey Johnson Smith.

Despite losing her seat, she was elected to the Labour Party's National Executive Committee, serving from 1960 to 1961 and again from 1968 to 1980. After a period working for The Guardian, she regained her seat in the 1964 general election. The seat was renamed Camden, Holborn and St Pancras South in 1974, and she retained it until the 1979 general election. Despite the Conservative election victory, her seat was retained by Labour's Frank Dobson.

Upon her retirement from the House of Commons, she was made a life peer as Baroness Jeger, of St Pancras in Greater London. In the House of Lords, she served as opposition spokesman on health, and then on social security. She served as vice-chair of the Labour Party's National Executive Committee from 1978 to 1979. She was chairman of the party in 1979 to 1980, and was the first peer to take the chair at the Labour party conference, at Blackpool in September 1980. She continued to write occasional pieces for The Guardian from 1964 to 2003, particularly obituaries. Before her death in February 2007, she was the oldest living female former UK Member of Parliament - after which Dame Peggy Fenner acquired that honour.

She suffered from poor health in her later years. She was treated at the Royal Marsden hospital for cancer and was granted a leave of absence from the House of Lords. She had no children.

[edit] References

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by
Santo Jeger		 Member of Parliament for Holborn and St Pancras South
1953–1959		 Succeeded by
Geoffrey Johnson-Smith
Preceded by
Geoffrey Johnson Smith		 Member of Parliament for Holborn and St Pancras South
1964–1979		 Succeeded by
Frank Dobson
Political offices
Preceded by
Frank Allaun		 Chair of The Labour Party
1979–1980		 Succeeded by
Alex Kitson
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