Candy Atherton

Candice Kathleen Atherton (21 September 1955 – 30 October 2017) was a British Labour politician and journalist. After serving as a councillor in Islington, where she was mayor, she was Member of Parliament (MP) for Falmouth and Camborne from 1997 to 2005. In her later life she lived in Cornwall and was a member of Cornwall Council.

Early life

Atherton was born in Surrey,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> the daughter of Denis Atherton, a Daily Mirror journalist, and Pamela (née Osborne), a businesswoman.<ref name=Langdon /> She attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart (now Woldingham School) in Woldingham, Surrey, then Midhurst Grammar School in West Sussex.<ref name=Langdon /> From the Polytechnic of North London (now London Metropolitan University), she graduated BA in Applied Social Studies in 1985.

Professional career

After leaving school, Atherton went to work for the Portsmouth News, before leaving after a year to join the Probation Service in West Sussex in 1975.<ref name=Langdon /> There she worked with young offenders and also helped to set up a women's shelter.<ref name=Langdon /> Atherton worked as a journalist from 1980. In 1984, she co-founded Everywoman – a "post-feminist" women's magazine – and later co-wrote a book on housing for single homeless people in North London.

Political career

In 1982, she led protests within the Labour Party and the CND movement against the Task Force sent to the Falkland Islands.<ref>Julian Lewis, When Is a Smear Not a Smear?, in Salisbury Review, October 1984, online at julianlewis.net</ref><ref name=DT />

From 1986 to 1992,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=BBC97>Template:Cite web</ref> she served as a Labour councillor in the London Borough of Islington and was mayor for the year 1989–1990.<ref name=DT /> There she chaired the Women's and Disability Committees and became a member of the Association of London Authorities.<ref name=Langdon />

Atherton stood for Labour at Chesham and Amersham in the 1992 general election.<ref name=BBC97 /> In the early 1990s, she left London and lived in Westbury, Wiltshire, where she stood unsuccessfully as a Labour candidate in the elections of 1993 to Wiltshire County Council.<ref>Colin Rallings, Michael Thrasher, Wiltshire County Council election Results 1973–2005, electionscentre.co.uk</ref>

She then worked for the Labour Party and Unison, before being selected to fight the three-way marginal seat of Falmouth and Camborne in Cornwall, after the local Labour Party had imposed the first all-women shortlist in the country. Such shortlists were subsequently ruled to be in breach of the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, and thus unlawful.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Despite that judgement, she remained in place as the candidate for the 1997 general election.<ref name=Langdon /><ref name=DT /> Taking Labour from third place to first, she was elected as the Member of Parliament for Falmouth and Camborne, holding the seat until the election of 2005. Atherton's victory made her Cornwall's first Labour MP since 1970<ref name=Langdon /> and first female MP since the 1920s.<ref name=DT>Template:Cite web</ref>

She doubled her majority in the 2001 election, having successfully campaigned for Objective One status for Cornwall, for the National Minimum Wage Act 1998, and for a university in Cornwall. She spearheaded the campaign to open a Minor Injuries Unit in Camborne Redruth Community Hospital – now used by more than 12,000 people a yearTemplate:Citation needed – and the campaign to expose the nerve gas station at Nancekuke (RRH Portreath) in her constituency.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

At the 2005 general election, Atherton lost her seat to Liberal Democrat Julia Goldsworthy by a majority of 1,886. Afterwards, she continued to campaign for women's political advancement, disability rights and rural housing reform.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Atherton was the most recent Labour MP to represent one of the six constituencies of Cornwall until 2024, when four Labour MPsTemplate:Efn won in the county.

Paul Phillips, a gay aide Atherton employed for a year until March 2004, resigned and claimed discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation, accusing her of homophobia and of asking him to find information on her Conservative opponent in Falmouth because he was also gay.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The tribunal found in Atherton's favour.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Atherton's record of voting in the House of Commons was generally supportive of gay rights.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

After Parliament

Template:More citations needed From 2005 to 2008, Atherton was a board member of the Housing Corporation and she chaired the Rural Housing Advisory Panel, which advises the British government on rural housing issues. In 2006, she founded Atherton Associates, a public affairs company,<ref>Atherton Associates website Template:Webarchive, athertonassociates.co.uk. Retrieved 31 October 2017.</ref> and has worked for British Waterways and the Inland Waterways Association and with Weber Shandwick Public Affairs. From October 2008, she was a board member of the Homes and Communities Agency. She was the vice chair of the Truro and Falmouth Constituency Labour Party and was member of the Labour Party's South West Regional Board.

Atherton married a Cornishman, Broderick Ross, in 2002, and lived with him in Falmouth, Cornwall. In 2009, Atherton, her husband, her mother Pam Atherton and mother-in law Betty Ross stood for election to the newly formed Cornwall Council. Atherton contested the Carn Brea North division, finishing third in a field of four, with 23% of the vote, while her husband finished last out of four in Camborne Central with 11%. Both seats were won by the Conservatives. Pam Atherton finished last out of six in St Day and Lanner with 3%Template:Citation needed, and Betty Ross finished last out of seven in Wendron, both of those contests being won by Independents.

Atherton was elected to Cornwall Council in the 2013 local elections,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> where she represented the Falmouth Smithick division until her death.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In 2014, she acted as the spearhead to pass an Article 4 direction through Cornwall Council, a piece of legislation which requires landlords planning to convert a property into a house of multiple occupancy (HMO) to have planning permission.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

She opposed the expansion of Falmouth University in 2016.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Death

Atherton died suddenly overnight in Luton,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Bedfordshire, on 30 October 2017 at the age of 62.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=Langdon>Template:Cite news</ref> Prime Minister Theresa May paid tribute to her at Prime Minister's Questions on 1 November, which were echoed by Leader of the Opposition Jeremy Corbyn.Template:Citation needed Tom Watson and Ben Bradshaw also paid tribute to Atherton on Twitter.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

See also

• 1993 Wiltshire Council election

External links

• They Work For You