Throughout her political career, Baroness Florence Horsbrugh achieved a string of notable firsts: she was the first woman to be elected MP for Dundee, the first woman to serve in a Conservative cabinet, the first woman to be appointed Privy Councillor, and the first MP ever interviewed on television.
The historian Kenneth Baxter described Horsbrugh as, "arguably the most successful female Conservative parliamentarian until Margaret Thatcher". It is said that she came into politics almost by accident when she stood in for an absent speaker. She was 41 years old when elected as a Unionist MP for Dundee, two years after women over 21 got the vote, and she continued until her defeat in 1945.
She unsuccessfully contested Midlothian and Peebles in 1950 and was instead elected in the delayed poll at Manchester Moss Side, sitting until she retired in 1959. She was then elevated to the House of Lords as a life peer with the title Baroness Horsbrugh, of Horsbrugh in the County of Peebles, where she sat until her death.
Horsbrugh held ministerial office in the wartime coalition governments as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health, and Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food. Between 1951 and 1954, she served as Minister for Education in the government of Winston Churchill.
She also served as a delegate to the Council of Europe and Western European Union from 1955 to 1960. Horsbrugh was appointed MBE in 1920, promoted to CBE in 1939, and to GBE in 1954. She was appointed a Privy Counsellor in the 1945 New Year’s Honours List.
Commemorative plaques
Celebrating people from all walks of life who have contributed to Scotland’s history.
Find out more
