Dame Patricia Hope Hewitt (born 2 December 1948) is an Australian-born British government adviser and former politician, who was the Secretary of State for Health from 2005 to 2007. A member of the Labour Party, she had previously been the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry from 2001 to 2005.
Hewitt's political career began in the 1970s, as a high-profile left-winger and supporter of Tony Benn. She was even classified by MI5 as an alleged communist sympathiser. After nine years as General Secretary of the National Council for Civil Liberties, she became press secretary to Neil Kinnock, whom she assisted in the modernisation of the Labour Party. In 1997, she became the first female MP for Leicester West, a safe Labour seat in the East Midlands, which she represented for thirteen years.
In 2001 she joined Blair's cabinet, the first of the 1997 intake of MPs to do so, as President of the Board of Trade and Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, before becoming Health Secretary in 2005. During her tenure, the ban on smoking in public places became legally enforceable. In March 2010, Hewitt was suspended from the Parliamentary Labour Party over the question of political lobbying irregularities, alleged on the Channel 4 Dispatches programme.
She is a former school governor at the Kentish Town Primary School.
In November 2022, British Chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt, announced that Hewitt would serve in an advisory role to the then Conservative Government.
Hewitt was born in Canberra, Australia. She is the daughter of Sir Lenox Hewitt, a leading Australian civil servant and later chairman of Qantas, and the former Hope Tillyard. Her maternal grandfather was entomologist Robert John Tillyard.
Hewitt was privately educated at Canberra Church of England Girls' Grammar School and the Australian National University. She then studied at Newnham College, Cambridge, where she graduated with a BA degree in English Literature (later promoted to an MA). She became a visiting fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford. She speaks French and is a keen gardener.
In 1970, Hewitt married David Julian Gibson-Watt, second son of David Gibson Watt, Conservative MP for Hereford, and Diana Hambro. The couple divorced in 1978. Originally a Conservative, by the time of her divorce she had moved to the left, becoming a committed feminist. MI5 classified her as a "Communist sympathiser" in the 1970s because of her relationship with William (Bill) Jack Birtles, a radical lawyer. In 1981, she married Birtles in Camden; they have a daughter (born September 1986) and a son (born February 1988). In 1971, she became Age Concern's Press and Public Relations Officer, before joining the National Council for Civil Liberties (now Liberty), initially as a women's rights officer in 1973, and for nine years from 1974 as the general secretary.
In 1990, the Council of Europe ruled that MI5 surveillance of both Hewitt and the NCCL legal officer, Harriet Harman, had breached the European Convention on Human Rights.
Hewitt joined the Labour Party in the 1970, and was initially a follower of Tony Benn; she publicly condemned those left-wing MPs who abstained in the deputy leadership election of 1981, giving Denis Healey a narrow victory. She was selected as the Labour candidate for Leicester East at the 1983 general election, following the defection of the sitting Labour MP, Tom Bradley, to the Social Democratic Party. Bradley stood for the SDP at the election, but the Conservative candidate, Peter Bruinvels, won the seat, beating Hewitt by just 933 votes.
Following her defeat in Leicester, she became press secretary to the Leader of the Opposition, Neil Kinnock. In this role she was a key player in the first stages of the 'modernisation' of the Labour Party and, along with Clive Hollick, helped set up the Institute for Public Policy Research and was its deputy director 1989–1994.
Following Labour's defeat in 1992, Hewitt was asked by the new Labour leader, John Smith, to help establish the Commission on Social Justice, of which she became deputy chair. She became head of research with Andersen Consulting, remaining in the post during the period 1994–1997.
Hewitt was elected to the House of Commons as the first female MP for Leicester West at the 1997 general election, following the retirement of the Labour MP Greville Janner. She was elected with a majority of 12,864 and remained the constituency MP until stepping down in 2010. She made her maiden speech on 3 July 1997. Leicester West is a safe Labour seat, with a majority of 9,070 votes in the 2005 general election.
In 1997, Hewitt was a member of the social security select committee for a year, before becoming a member of Tony Blair's government in his first reshuffle in 1998, as the Economic Secretary to the Treasury. She was promoted in 1999 to become a Minister of State for Small Business and E-Commerce at the Department of Trade and Industry, and created the Social Enterprise Unit for similar new companies. While in office Hewitt initiated a White Paper on telecommunications and broadcasting, jointly published by the DTI and DCMS; this proposed the merger of seven or more different regulators to create a single converged regulator, OFCOM. Hewitt was then responsible for appointing its first chairman, Lord Currie.
She joined the Blair Cabinet for the first time following the 2001 general election as the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and Minister for Women and Equality. She spent four years in this post and was seen as a fairly effective Trade and Industry Secretary despite controversial policies affecting her own constituency. However, she was seen as lacking leadership, particularly on consumer issues. Hewitt was then moved sideways to Health Secretary in May 2005.
Secretary of State for Trade and Industry
Hewitt became a member of the Privy Council in 2001 and was Secretary of State for Trade and Industry from June 2001 until May 2005. During her time at the DTI, Hewitt introduced the "say on pay" laws, which require public companies to hold an annual shareholders' vote on the Remuneration Committee report on senior executive pay.
Hewitt defended outsourcing public sector support jobs to countries such as India in May 2004, arguing that outsourcing supported poorer communities in India and opposing protectionist proposals.