| Teresa Gorman | |
|---|---|
| Member of Parliament for Billericay |
|
| In office 11 June 1987 – 7 June 2001 |
|
| Preceded by | Harvey Proctor |
| Succeeded by | John Baron |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 30 September 1931 |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party | Conservative |
Teresa Ellen Gorman (born 30 September 1931) is a British politician, and was Conservative Member of Parliament for Billericay, in the county of Essex in England until 2001 when she stood down. She has worked in both education and business.
Contents |
Born Teresa Ellen Moore, she was elected to the House in the 1987 election and was one of the Maastricht Rebels, who nearly brought John Major's government down over the Treaty of Maastricht.
In 1992, Gorman introduced an amendment to the Representation of the People Act under the Ten Minute Rule to give two seats to each constituency, one for a male MP and one for a female. The amendment received only a first reading.
At the 1997 general election, there was a massive swing towards her opponent, but she remained MP, with a much-reduced majority of 1,356. She tried to stand for the Conservative Mayor of London candidacy for the election in 2000, but was blocked.
In February 2000, she was suspended from the House of Commons for a month for failing to disclose on the Register of Interests between 1987 and 1994 three rented properties in south London and for her failure to register two rented-out Portuguese properties from 1987-99. The Commons' Standards and Privileges committee also found she should not have introduced a Ten Minute Rule Bill in 1990 proposing the repeal of the Rent Acts without registering and declaring a financial interest.
Considered an able but maverick politician, Gorman was famous for her public endorsement of hormone replacement therapy, her tattooed eyebrows (she shaved them off as a teenager and they never grew back) and her belief that rapists should be castrated. Gorman disliked what she termed "middle-class idiots", chauvinists, the EU, wet Tories, and the attitude of those in the Conservative Party who thought they were born to rule. Surprisingly, in the 1997 leadership election, Gorman deserted right-winger John Redwood because she believed that he was "a bad-mannered, insensitive snob whose remarks on single mothers were a disaster". She voted for Kenneth Clarke, who was in favour of stronger ties with the EU as opposed to a right-wing eurosceptic, William Hague.
When Gorman first sought the candidature for the Billericay seat before the 1987 election, she claimed to have been born in 1941 rather than 1931.
She is a council member of The Freedom Association.
Gorman was interviewed about her membership of The Freedom Association and the rise of Thatcherism for the 2006 BBC TV documentary series Tory! Tory! Tory!.
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Harvey Proctor |
Member of Parliament for Billericay 1987–2001 |
Succeeded by John Baron |