the times | Wednesday April 13 2022 53
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Pop singer whose lyrics
influenced Paul McCartney
Bobby Rydell
Page 54There were two sides to Jill Knight, an
MP who for 31 years represented Edg-
baston, a constituency with a univers-
ity, Pebble Mill studios and fine homes
and gardens along leafy lanes in Bir-
mingham. She was, as one contempo-
rary described her, “a large, jolly
woman with a peaches-and-cream
complexion, a big smile and a love of
dazzlingly bright floral dresses”. She
sometimes wore these dresses in the
chamber of the House of Commons.
One in particular, with a swishingly full
skirt and a pattern of large blue hydran-
geas on a white ground, was still re-
membered and talked about in West-
minster years after it had been safely
dispatched to a charity shop. It was al-
most as if it haunted the place.
That individual sense of style was one
side, then. On the other side she had a
reputation as a homophobic bigot
because of her role in the controversial
Section 28 of the 1988 Local Govern-
ment Act. She successfully moved an
amending clause that forbade local
authorities to promote homosexuality.
There were mass protests against the
clause and she received what she called
“a most appalling campaign of porno-
graphic telephone calls”. To show good-
will, and that she was not anti-gay as
such, she said that gay people were
“very good at antiques”; hunting an-
tiques happened to be one of her hob-
bies. A friend said the remark might
well be written on her gravestone.
She defended her stance on the
grounds that she was protecting young
children and the family. The same
values led her to oppose the easing of
divorce laws and the same-sex mar-
riage bill in 2013. Section 28 was finally
repealed in 2003, and in 2009 David
Cameron, the Conservative leader,
apologised. Many years later Knight
said she was “sorry if the law hurt any-
one”. Yet she remained a hate figure for
the gay community.
Without ever holding ministerial
office, Knight made her own contribu-
tion to the Commons and to Conserva-
tive Party politics. Her initiative and
commitment helped her to get a record
five private member’s bills onto the
statute book, often adding clauses to
existing legislation. Her successes in-
cluded child-proof packaging and the
right of a British mother to pass on her
nationality to children born abroad. It
was unfortunate that Section 28
dwarfed them all in terms of her reputa-
tion. Her politics, shaped by a 1930s up-
bringing, her wartime experiences, de-
vout Anglicanism and a fractured
childhood, were a mixture of One
Nation Conservatism and the right-
wing Monday Club. Strong beliefs on
some issues led to a rejection of nuance
that angered opponents.
Born in Bristol in 1923, Joan Christie
was a twin, and after neighbours re-
ferred to her and her brother as Jack
and Jill, the name Jill stuck. Her father,
Arthur Mark Meek, was an accountant
and her mother, Alma, a graduate of
Bristol University, a teacher. They di-
vorced when the twins were only a few
years old, and all contact between
father and children was lost, something
Jill felt deeply. Her last memory of her
father was a row at the front door. He
came to see the children, bringing toys;
the mother took in the toys but sent him
packing amid much commotion, which
the children could hear from their beds.
Close friends believed that her parents’
divorce was a defining experience and
led to her lifelong defence of family life,
marriage and vulnerable children.
Knight was educated at Fairfield
School, Bristol, and King Edward
Grammar School, Handsworth. The
family had moved to Birmingham after
her mother was married for the second
time, to Edwin Murch. In the Second
World War Knight served with the
Women’s Royal Air Force from the age
of 17. Her unit served in Amiens, andlater, while posted in Hamburg, she
showed a talent for acting, singing and
dancing and went on to become a
leading light in the Girls Gang Show.
She often said that the experience gave
her confidence in addressing and hold-
ing an audience.
Politics was not much discussed in
the home, and it was her experience at
school that inspired her Conservatism.
Her English teacher was a Labour sup-
porter and set William Morris’s News
from Nowhere for her form to read.
Knight wrote an essay criticising it. The
feisty youngster later complained that
the teacher penalised her for her views,
and that set her against his politics.
While in the forces she met James
Montague (“Monty”) Knight, her best
friend’s brother, and he proposed to her.Over 40 and still seeking
a seat, she trimmed a
few years off her age
Obituaries
Baroness Knight of Collingtree
Long-serving Conservative MP and life peer known for her controversial views on homosexuality, her big hats and her floral dresses
DAVE M. BENETT/GETTY IMAGES; HARRY KERR/TIMES NEWSPAPERS LTDWith Lord Lang of
Monkton in 2009 at
the parliamentary
variety show and
below, addressing
the 1961 Tory
conferenceBefore agreeing, she told him that
she wanted to be a Conservative
politician, a decision that delighted
her husband-to-be: better for her to
be a politician than an actress.
They married in 1947, setting up
what was to be the family’s per-
manent home in Northampton,
where he had his practice as an op-
tician. They had two sons, Andrew,
a software engineer, and Roger, a
finance director. Monty died of
leukaemia in 1986.
Already a local councillor, she
contested Northampton in the
1959 and 1964 general elections.
The sitting Labour MP was Sir
Reginald Paget QC (later Lord Paget),
an Old Etonian who sailed his boat with
the Royal Ocean Racing Club and was
master of foxhounds of the Pytchley
Hunt, one of the most prestigious in
England. It was said that whenever he
rode to hounds he would encourage his
hunting friends to come into North-
ampton to buy their hunting boots.
Knight lost both elections but im-
pressed with spirited campaigns.
Two years later a by-election came
up in Edgbaston after the death of
Dame Edith Pitt. The safe Tory seat
attracted 214 approved applicants,
some very well known. The selection
committee, won over by Knight’s self-
confidence and sure grassroots touch,
abandoned the customary practice of
forwarding three names to the main
constituency association for final selec-
tion. Only one name from the 214
applicants was put forward, that of Jill
Knight, and it was accepted with
acclamation.It is easy to overlook what an
achievement it was then for a woman to
be selected as a Conservative candi-
date, let alone for a winnable seat.
Many selection committees took the
view that a woman’s place was at home.
Earlier she had failed to be selected for
a winnable seat, and the winner, who
became the MP, told her he had been
informed that if she had been a man,
“we’d have selected her, not you”. In the
1966 general election only 21 women
were selected as candidates, and only
seven were elected MPs. She was the
first woman to succeed another woman
as an MP, and in 1997 she was succeeded
by another, Gisela Stuart.
As chairwoman of the British section
of the Inter-Parliamentary Union in
the 1990s she did not shirk the sharp
issues, such as denouncing landmines
and calling for a halt to their manufac-
ture and sale, a cause later taken up by
Diana, Princess of Wales. Knight had a
genuine liking for foreigners and hadpreviously spent nine years on the
Council of Europe. For six years she was
vice-chairwoman of the Tories’ influ-
ential backbench 1922 Committee, and
she had previously been its secretary. In
1981 she defeated Dr Brian Mawhinney
(later party chairman) for the vice-
chairmanship of the Conservative
backbench health committee, and the
following year she became its chair-
woman, a position she held for 15 years.
She lost her 1922 Committee post
after voting against her government’s
introduction of charges for eye tests
and dental checkups. She argued that
the damage done to people who could
“choose a pair of shoes or an eye test but
not both” was unlikely to be put right in
future. She spoke with knowledge as
well as feeling, given that her husband
was an optician.Knight’s enthusiastic support for
many causes made her a populist au-
thoritarian figure. She backed Enoch
Powell over his infamous “rivers
of blood” speech in 1968, which
led to Edward Heath sacking him
from the shadow cabinet. She
often called for strict immigra-
tion controls, opposed sanctions
on the white-run regimes of
South Africa and Rhodesia, fa-
voured the return of hanging and
was for many years a member of
the Monday Club.
There was some confusion over
when she was born. Her Who’s
Who entry omits her date of birth.
When she was over 40 and still
seeking a seat, she trimmed a few
years off her age.
She retired as an MP in 1997 and
was awarded a life peerage in John
Major’s honours list. She enjoyed
the gentler pace, courtesy and lack
of partisanship in friendships in the
Lords, although she still battled for
causes related to family life.
From 1978 until her retirement,
without a break, she had been
chairwoman of the Lords and
Commons all-party children and
family protection group, supporting
many children’s causes and charities.
She resolutely opposed David Steel’s
private member’s bill that became the
Abortion Act 1967 (“it could have been
me”) and was the last survivor of the 29
who voted against the second reading.
She said, “Babies are not like bad teeth
to be jerked out,” and warned that it
would lead to abortion on demand. On
retiring from the Lords in 2016 she told
friends: “After 50 years and eight mil-
lion abortions I know that I was right.”
She also realised her ambition, that
year, to be the first woman to serve 50
continuous years in the two houses. Yet,
for all that, she knew that her obituaries
would open with her controversial
views on homosexuality, and her floral
dresses.Baroness Knight of Collingtree,
Conservative politician, was born on
July 9, 1923. She died on April 6, 2022,
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