Joyce Gwendolen Quin, Baroness Quin, (born 26 November 1944) is a British Labour Party politician. She served as

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) for Gateshead East and Washington West and for its predecessor Gateshead East from 1987 to 2005.

Early life and career

Quin was educated at Whitley Bay Grammar School, and Newcastle University where she gained first class honours in French and was first in her year. She subsequently gained an M.Sc. in International Relations at the London School of Economics. She worked as a French language lecturer and tutor at the

University of Bath (Virgil, Georgics II) , mottoeng = Learn the culture proper to each after its kind , established = 1886 (Merchant Venturers Technical College) 1960 (Bristol College of Science and Technology) 1966 (Bath University of Technology) 1971 (univ ...

and Durham University. Quin is the grand-niece of Labour Party politician Joshua Ritson (1874–1955). She served as

Member of the European Parliament A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its ...

for Tyne South and Wear and

Tyne and Wear Tyne and Wear () is a metropolitan county in North East England, situated around the mouths of the rivers Tyne and Wear. It was created in 1974, by the Local Government Act 1972, along with five metropolitan boroughs of Gateshead, Newc ...

successively from 1979 to 1989. During her time as an MEP she served as Labour spokesperson on Fisheries from 1979 to 1984. She was a member of the Agriculture, Women's Rights, Regional and Economic Affairs Committee. In 1979, she tabled the resolution to set up a Register of Members' Interests which was eventually accepted by the European Parliament.

Member of Parliament

Quin entered the

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 ...

in the 1987 election as

for Gateshead East. In Opposition (1987-1997) she served on the Labour front bench as a Shadow Minister for Consumer Affairs, Trade Policy, Regional Policy and Employment (dealing with the EU Social Chapter). From 1994 to 1997 she served as Shadow Europe Minister and was Deputy to Shadow Foreign Secretary

Robin Cook Robert Finlayson "Robin" Cook (28 February 19466 August 2005) was a British Labour politician who served as a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1974 until his death in 2005 and served in the Cabinet as Foreign Secretary from 1997 until 2001 wh ...

. After boundary changes for the 1997 general election, she represented the new Gateshead East and Washington West constituency from 1997 until she stepped down at the 2005 general election and was replaced by

Sharon Hodgson Sharon Hodgson (born 1 April 1966) is a British Labour Party politician serving as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Washington and Sunderland West, previously Gateshead East and Washington West, since 2005. Hodgson was appointed as the Par ...

. Quin served as prisons minister,

Minister for Europe Minister may refer to: * Minister (Christianity), a Christian cleric ** Minister (Catholic Church) * Minister (government), a member of government who heads a ministry (government department) ** Minister without portfolio, a member of governme ...

, and as Minister of State for Agriculture (and deputy to Cabinet Minister, Nick Brown). She asked to retire as a minister in 2001 to concentrate on her constituency interests. She had intended to stand for membership of a North East Regional Assembly on her retirement from Westminster, but the proposed body was rejected by a margin of 4–1 in a

referendum A referendum (plural: referendums or less commonly referenda) is a direct vote by the electorate on a proposal, law, or political issue. This is in contrast to an issue being voted on by a representative. This may result in the adoption of a ...

in November 2004. In Parliament as a backbencher Quin was the first woman to chair the Northern Group of Labour MPs and Chaired the All-Party Group for France (Franco-British Parliamentary Group). She successfully lobbied Chancellor Gordon Brown to bring in the nationwide concessionary bus travel scheme for pensioners

Life peer

In April 2006, it was announced that Quin had been nominated for a

life peerage In the United Kingdom, life peers are appointed members of the peerage whose titles cannot be inherited, in contrast to hereditary peers. In modern times, life peerages, always created at the rank of baron, are created under the Life Peerages A ...

by the Labour Party. On 30 May, she was created Baroness Quin, of Gateshead in the County of Tyne and Wear. Quin was appointed a shadow Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs minister by

Harriet Harman Harriet Ruth Harman (born 30 July 1950) is a British politician and solicitor who has served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Camberwell and Peckham, formerly Peckham, since 1982. A member of the Labour Party, she has served in various Cabi ...

in May 2010, and was retained in that role by

Ed Miliband Edward Samuel "Ed" Miliband (born 24 December 1969) is a British politician serving as Shadow Secretary of State for Climate Change and Net Zero since 2021. He has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Doncaster North since 2005. Miliban ...

after his election as Leader of the Labour Party. She stood down from this position in July 2011. In November 2007, Baroness Quin was appointed Chair of the Franco-British Council (British Section). In 2010 she was awarded "Officier de la Légion d'Honneur" by the French Government. She was interviewed in 2014 as part of

The History of Parliament The History of Parliament is a project to write a complete history of the United Kingdom Parliament and its predecessors, the Parliament of Great Britain and the Parliament of England. The history will principally consist of a prosopography, in w ...

's oral history project. Quin has volunteered as a

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...

City Tourist Guide since 1976. She is President of the

Northumbrian Pipers' Society The Northumbrian Pipers' Society was founded to promote both types of Northumbrian bagpipes – the Northumbrian smallpipes and the half-long pipes, now generally known as the Border pipes. There had been several attempts to encourage the pipes a ...

(since 2009) and President of th
Northumberland National Park Foundation
(since 2016). Since September 2017 she has been Chair of the Strategic Board of

Tyne and Wear Museums Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums (TWAM) is a regional group of United Kingdom national museums and the county archives service located across the Tyne and Wear area of north-east England. They have been administered by a joint board of local author ...

. In 2010 Quin authored a book titled "The British Constitution, Continuity and Change - An Inside View: Authoritative Insight into How Modern Britain Works" Robert Waller, Byron Criddle, ''The Almanac of British politics''
(vol 7), Routledge (2002); , , page 383. published by Northern Writers and is co-author of the book “Angels of the North - Notable Women of the North-East” with Moira Kilkenny, published 2018, reprinted 2019 by Tyne Bridge Publishing .

References

, - , - , - , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Quin, Joyce 1944 births Living people Academics of Durham University Academics of the University of Bath Alumni of Newcastle University Alumni of the London School of Economics Life peeresses created by Elizabeth II Female members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies British people of Irish descent Labour Party (UK) life peers Labour Party (UK) MEPs Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom MEPs for England 1979–1984 MEPs for England 1984–1989 20th-century women MEPs for England Transport and General Workers' Union-sponsored MPs UK MPs 1987–1992 UK MPs 1992–1997 UK MPs 1997–2001 UK MPs 2001–2005 20th-century British women politicians 21st-century British women politicians 21st-century English women 21st-century English people