Florence Beatrice Paton (''née'' Widdowson; 1 June 1891 – 12 October 1976) was a Labour Party politician in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

, and a

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

(MP) from

1945 1945 marked the end of World War II and the fall of Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan. It is also the only year in which Nuclear weapon, nuclear weapons Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, have been used in combat. Events Below, ...

1950 Events January * January 1 – The International Police Association (IPA) – the largest police organization in the world – is formed. * January 5 – Sverdlovsk plane crash: ''Aeroflot'' Lisunov Li-2 crashes in a snowstorm. All 19 ...

Early life

She was born in

Taunton Taunton () is the county town of Somerset, England, with a 2011 population of 69,570. Its thousand-year history includes a 10th-century monastic foundation, Taunton Castle, which later became a priory. The Normans built a castle owned by the ...

Somerset ( en, All The People of Somerset) , locator_map = , coordinates = , region = South West England , established_date = Ancient , established_by = , preceded_by = , origin = , lord_lieutenant_office =Lord Lieutenant of Somerset , lord_ ...

, where her father was a railway guard. The family moved to

Wolverhampton Wolverhampton () is a city, metropolitan borough and administrative centre in the West Midlands, England. The population size has increased by 5.7%, from around 249,500 in 2011 to 263,700 in 2021. People from the city are called "Wulfrunians ...

, where she later became a schoolteacher. A

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's ...

lay preacher, she was initially a

Liberal Liberal or liberalism may refer to: Politics * a supporter of liberalism ** Liberalism by country * an adherent of a Liberal Party * Liberalism (international relations) * Sexually liberal feminism * Social liberalism Arts, entertainment and m ...

, but joined the

Independent Labour Party The Independent Labour Party (ILP) was a British political party of the left, established in 1893 at a conference in Bradford, after local and national dissatisfaction with the Liberals' apparent reluctance to endorse working-class candidates ...

(ILP) in 1917.

Electoral history

Under her maiden name of Florence Widdowson, she first stood for

Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. Th ...

at the Cheltenham by-election in 1928, and at the 1929 general election, she contested the

Rushcliffe Rushcliffe is a local government district with borough status in Nottinghamshire, England. The population of the Local Authority at the 2011 Census was 111,129. Its councilRushcliffe Borough Council Nottinghamshire Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The trad ...

. After her marriage in 1930 to the future Labour MP John Paton, she stood again in Rushcliffe in

1931 Events January * January 2 – South Dakota native Ernest Lawrence invents the cyclotron, used to accelerate particles to study nuclear physics. * January 4 – German pilot Elly Beinhorn begins her flight to Africa. * January 22 – Sir I ...

. When the ILP split from Labour in 1932, John and Florence Paton stayed with the ILP. They left the following year, and rejoined the Labour Party, but by then the Rushcliffe

Constituency Labour Party __NOTOC__ A constituency Labour Party (CLP) is an organisation of members of the British Labour Party who live in a particular parliamentary constituency. In England and Wales, CLP boundaries coincide with those for UK parliamentary constituenc ...

had selected H. J. Cadogan as its prospective parliamentary candidate. She was reselected as candidate only after Cadogan had been defeated in the

1934 by-election Events January–February * January 1 – The International Telecommunication Union, a specialist agency of the League of Nations, is established. * January 15 – The 8.0 1934 Nepal–Bihar earthquake, Nepal–Bihar earthquake strik ...

and at the 1935 general election. She won the Rushcliffe seat at the

1945 general election The following elections occurred in the year 1945. Africa * 1945 South-West African legislative election Asia * 1945 Indian general election Australia * 1945 Fremantle by-election Europe * 1945 Albanian parliamentary election * 1945 Bulgarian ...

, but after boundary changes in 1950, she stood at the 1950 general election in the new Carlton constituency. She lost by only 395 votes to the Conservative Party candidate

Kenneth Pickthorn Sir Kenneth William Murray Pickthorn, 1st Baronet, PC (23 April 1892 – 12 November 1975) was a British academic and politician. The eldest son of Charles Wright Pickthorn, master mariner, and Edith Maud Berkeley Murray, he was educated at Aldenh ...

, and although she stood again in

1951 Events January * January 4 – Korean War: Third Battle of Seoul – Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul for the second time (having lost the Second Battle of Seoul in September 1950). * January 9 – The Government of the United ...

and 1955, Pickthorn increased his majority on each occasion.

In Parliament

At the start of the 1946-47 session of Parliament, she was nominated by the

Speaker Speaker may refer to: Society and politics * Speaker (politics), the presiding officer in a legislative assembly * Public speaker, one who gives a speech or lecture * A person producing speech: the producer of a given utterance, especially: ** I ...

to the Chairmen's Panel of Members to act as temporary chairmen of committees of the whole House and chairmen of standing committees. During a supply day debate on Scottish civil aviation estimates on 31 May 1948, she became the first woman to preside over the whole

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. T ...

. She did not, however, sit in the Speaker's Chair. When the House is in committee, the chairman sits at the table, rather than in the Speaker's Chair; the first woman to occupy the Speaker's Chair was the Conservative Party MP

Betty Harvie Anderson Margaret Betty Harvie Anderson, Baroness Skrimshire of Quarter, (12 August 1913 – 7 November 1979) was a British Conservative Party politician. She was the first woman to become a Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons, which she served as ...

(Conservative), on 2 July 1970, who took the Chair during the debate on the Queen's Speech.Women in the House of Commons
, House of Commons Information Office, Members series Factsheet M04 In 1947, she was a British delegate to the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmoniz ...

After Parliament

From 1955 to 1958, Paton was a member of the Royal Commission on

common land Common land is land owned by a person or collectively by a number of persons, over which other persons have certain common rights, such as to allow their livestock to graze upon it, to collect wood, or to cut turf for fuel. A person who has a ...

. She died in Wolverhampton on 12 October 1976. Her husband

John John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Secon ...

, who had held his parliamentary seat until 1964, died two months later.

Notes

References

Centre for Advancement of Women in Politics: Florence Paton
* Dictionary of National Biography: Florence Beatrice Paton (1891–1976) * *

External links

*
Florence Beatrice Paton
portraits at the National Portrait Gallery, London {{DEFAULTSORT:Paton, Florence Beatrice 1891 births 1976 deaths People from Wolverhampton Female members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies Independent Labour Party politicians Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies UK MPs 1945–1950 British evangelists British Methodists Methodist evangelists People from Taunton 20th-century British women politicians 20th-century Methodists