| Intro | British politician and businesswoman | ||||||
| Is |
Politician Businessperson |
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| From | United Kingdom | ||||||
| Type |
Business Politics |
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| Gender | female | ||||||
| Birth | 27 January 1943 | ||||||
| Age: | 77 years | ||||||
| Star sign | Aquarius | ||||||
| Politics | Conservative Party | ||||||
| Awards |
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Julia Frances Cumberlege, Baroness Cumberlege (née Camm), CBE, DSG, DL (born 27 January 1943) is a British Conservative Party politician and businesswoman. She was created a life peer in 1990 as Baroness Cumberlege, of Newick in the County of East Sussex.
Early life and education
Daughter of Dr Lambert Ulrich Camm (né Kamm; d. 1997), of Appleton, Newick, East Sussex, general practitioner, the first medical officer for Plumpton Racecourse and formerly of the Indian Medical Service, and Mary Geraldine (née Russell), she was educated at the Convent of the Sacred Heart School, at Tunbridge Wells, Kent.
Career
After her marriage in 1961 and raising her three sons, Cumberlege served in local government as a justice of the peace for East Sussex from 1973 to 1985, and a member of East Sussex County Council from 1974 to 1985. She was appointed CBE in 1985, and served as a Deputy Lieutenant of East Sussex from 1986 to 1991.
As chair of a review team commissioned by the Department of Health and Social Security, Cumberlege produced a report in 1986 which, among other things, recommended that nurses should be able to prescribe some drugs. From 1987 to 1989, she was a member of the DHSS Expert Advisory Group on AIDS.
In 1992 she was appointed a Junior Health Minister and for five years covered all health and social services matters in the House of Lords. She was also the Sponsor Minister for the city of Plymouth responsible for regeneration and a budget of £45 million per year. In 1997 she was Opposition Spokesperson for Health.
In the House of Lords in 2000 on the subject of the Britain’s National Health Service, remarking that “We are all trapped in a marvellously pure ideology, the ideal socialist dream”, she advocated removing the requirement that the NHS be free at the point of use, replacing it with “an NHS insurance premium”, and that “allowances could be made for those with private insurance and private expertise could be used”. She also said that “The NHS ought not to exclude as a matter of principle the private sector” stating that “Competition is both a spur and a discipline”. She said that “some might advocate putting a hospital or two under private management if only to prove that the Government can do it better.” She later went on to say, “I am not advocating privatising the NHS. An undiluted private health insurance scheme is not the answer. With current schemes, so much seems to be excluded. And just when the need is greatest the premiums become unaffordable.”
In 2010 she was awarded an Honorary Fellowship by the Royal College of Nursing.
She conducted a review of maternity services for NHS England in 2015. Better Births, the report of the review, recommended that all women should have the choice to give birth where they want, with the support of the same midwife throughout pregnancy, labour and the early weeks of motherhood, with control over a personal maternity care budget of £3,000 to be spent on the NHS care they choose.
Business ventures
In 2001 she launched Cumberlege Connections Ltd.; this became Cumberlege Eden and Partners in 2013. These companies specialized in health sector training and consultancy.
Affiliations
- Trustee, Cancer Research UK
- Senior Associate, The King’s Fund.
- Co-chair, Associate Parliamentary Health Group and the All Party Parliamentary Osteoporosis Group
- Secretary, Dying Well Parliamentary Group
- Vice President, Royal Society for Public Health
- Honorary Fellow, Royal College of Physicians
- Vice President of the Royal Colleges of Nursing and Midwives
- Chair of Trustees, Chailey Heritage School
- President, Age UK East Sussex
- Patron, Pregnancy Sickness Support
- Patron, Education for Health
- Patron, The MASIC Foundation
- Patron, The Iolanthe Midwifery Trust
Personal life
In 1961, she married Patrick Francis Howard Cumberlege, of Vuggles Farm, Newick, Lewes, Sussex, sometime chairman of the Newick Village Society and formerly of the Royal Navy, grandson of Sir Alexander Doran Gibbons, 7th Baronet. They have three sons.
Religious views
A Roman Catholic, she spoke at the Catholic Medical Association (formerly the Guild of Catholic Doctors)’s conference in Bristol in April 2009, officiated by Archbishop Peter Smith.
Sex abuse in the Catholic Church
In 2006–07, Lady Cumberlege chaired a commission reviewing the approach of the Catholic Church in England and Wales to child protection.