Kate Hoey
Catharine Letitia Hoey, Baroness Hoey (born 21 June 1946), better known as Kate Hoey, is a Northern Irish politician and life peer who served as Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Home Affairs from 1998 to 1999 and Minister for Sport from 1999 to 2001. During the 1970s Hoey was involved in radical far-left groups but by the end of the decade became involved with the Labour Party. Hoey remained a member of the Labour Party for several decades while she was Member of Parliament (MP) for Vauxhall from 1989 to 2019, but resigned from the party in 2020.
The Baroness Hoey | |||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Official portrait, 2022 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Chair of the Northern Ireland Affairs Select Committee | |||||||||||||||||||
| Acting 15 May 2019 – 12 June 2019 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Andrew Murrison | ||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Simon Hoare | ||||||||||||||||||
| Minister for Sport | |||||||||||||||||||
| In office 20 October 1999 – 7 June 2001 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Prime Minister | Tony Blair | ||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Tony Banks | ||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Richard Caborn | ||||||||||||||||||
| Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department | |||||||||||||||||||
| In office 28 July 1998 – 29 July 1999 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Prime Minister | Tony Blair | ||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | The Lord Williams of Mostyn | ||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | The Lord Bassam of Brighton | ||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||
| Personal details | |||||||||||||||||||
| Born | 21 June 1946 Mallusk, County Antrim, Northern Ireland | ||||||||||||||||||
| Political party | Non-affiliated (2020–present) Labour (before 2019) | ||||||||||||||||||
| Residence | Northern Ireland | ||||||||||||||||||
| Alma mater | University of Ulster London Guildhall University | ||||||||||||||||||
| Website | www.katehoey.com | ||||||||||||||||||
Hoey has attracted a high level of attention throughout her career, but particularly in the 2010s, holding many socially conservative views that brought her into conflict with fellow members of Labour. Early in her life, Hoey was radically in favour of a United Ireland; however, in more recent decades she has pulled away from this view, declaring in 2017 "I’m pro-union, I’ll do anything to make sure that the United Kingdom has Northern Ireland as an integral part of it on the same terms as any other part of the United Kingdom when we leave the EU."