Patricia Hewitt | |
|---|---|
 Official portrait, 2006 | |
| Secretary of State for Health | |
| In office 6 May 2005 – 28 June 2007 | |
| Prime Minister | Tony Blair |
| Preceded by | John Reid |
| Succeeded by | Alan Johnson |
| Secretary of State for Trade and Industry President of the Board of Trade | |
| In office 8 June 2001 – 6 May 2005 | |
| Prime Minister | Tony Blair |
| Preceded by | Stephen Byers |
| Succeeded by | Alan Johnson |
| Minister for Women | |
| In office 8 June 2001 – 6 May 2005 | |
| Prime Minister | Tony Blair |
| Preceded by | The Baroness Jay of Paddington |
| Succeeded by | Tessa Jowell |
| Economic Secretary to the Treasury | |
| In office 27 July 1998 – 17 May 1999 | |
| Prime Minister | Tony Blair |
| Preceded by | Helen Liddell |
| Succeeded by | Melanie Johnson |
| Member of Parliament for Leicester West | |
| In office 1 May 1997 – 12 April 2010 | |
| Preceded by | Greville Janner |
| Succeeded by | Liz Kendall |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Patricia Hope Hewitt 2 December 1948 Canberra, Australia |
| Political party | Labour |
| Spouse(s) | David Gibson-Watt (1970–1978) Bill Birtles (1981–2020†) |
| Children | 2 |
| Relatives | Lenox Hewitt (father) |
| Alma mater | Australian National University Newnham College, Cambridge |
Patricia Hope Hewitt (born 2 December 1948) is a 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.