Elspeth Howe
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Elspeth Rosamund Morton Howe, Baroness Howe of Idlicote, Baroness Howe of Aberavon,<ref name="3610/career">Template:Cite web</ref> Template:Postnom (née Shand; 8 February 1932 – 22 March 2022) was a British life peer and crossbench member of the House of Lords (2001–2020) who served in many capacities in public life.
As the widow of Geoffrey Howe, she was formerly known as Lady Howe of Aberavon before receiving a peerage in her own right.
She was the paternal half-aunt of Queen Camilla.
Early life
Born Elspeth R. M. Shand in Marylebone,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> London, she was the daughter of the writer Philip Morton Shand by his fourth wife, Sybil Mary Shand (née Sissons, formerly Slee).<ref name="Langdon 2022">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
As such, she was a half-aunt to Queen Camilla (née Shand, formerly Parker Bowles), whose father, Bruce Shand, was son of Philip Morton Shand by a previous marriage.<ref name="Langdon 2022" /> She grew up in Bath, Somerset,<ref name="Langdon 2022" /> and was educated at Wycombe Abbey, a private school for girls, and at the London School of Economics.<ref name="Langdon 2022" />
She married the rising politician Geoffrey Howe in 1953, and had three children.<ref name="Lord Howe of Aberavon obituary">Template:Cite news</ref>
Career
Howe was deputy chairman of the Equal Opportunities Commission from 1975 to 1979,<ref name="Langdon 2022" /> and worked in other capacities from 1980. She was later chair of the Broadcasting Standards Commission. In the 1999 New Year Honours she was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE).<ref>Template:London Gazette</ref>
Lady Howe was a Justice of the Peace in Inner London from 1964 until her retirement from the Bench in 2002. She sat in the Youth Court at Camberwell where she was a bench chairman.
On 29 June 2001, at the age of 69, she was made a life peer, as Baroness Howe of Idlicote, of Shipston-on-Stour in the County of Warwickshire,<ref>Template:London Gazette</ref> in her own right, becoming one of the first People's Peers. She and her husband Geoffrey Howe were one of the few couples each of whom held a peerage in their own right.
Having already been styled Lady Howe by dint of her husband's knighthood and then his peerage, it was quipped when she received her own peerage that she was "once, twice, three times a Lady".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Howe retired from Parliament on 2 June 2020.<ref name="3610/career" />
Death
Elspeth Howe, Baroness Howe of Idlicote died at her home in Idlicote, Warwickshire, on 22 March 2022, aged 90, having had cancer.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Arms
References
External links
- 1932 births
- 2022 deaths
- Shand family
- Peers recommended by the House of Lords Appointments Commission
- Crossbench life peers
- Commanders of the Order of the British Empire
- People educated at Wycombe Abbey
- Honorary Fellows of the London School of Economics
- Spouses of life peers
- Deaths from cancer in England
- Life peeresses created by Elizabeth II
- Life peers created by Elizabeth II
- Wives of knights
- Peers retired under the House of Lords Reform Act 2014