Harriet Harman has revealed she had a violent stalker after she was elected as a Labour MP but kept it a secret.
The MP for Camberwell and Peckham who briefly served as Labour chief was first elected in 1982 and is the longest-serving feminine MP.
In an interview with the Sunday Times, she mentioned “there was a guy who’d been in prison for various acts of violence who did become fixated with me, and did come to my advice surgery and write letters and put them through my letterbox and wait outside my house”.
Asked why she hadn’t spoken about it publicly earlier than, Ms Harman mentioned: “Because I didn’t want people to think I was too timid and beset with problems to get on with the job…There was always the worry at the time that a woman MP would be so engulfed with her own problems, she wouldn’t be able to help other people with theirs.”
Ms Harman mentioned that she finally reported the stalker to the police.
Female MPs have mentioned that threats have escalated in recent times, with many frequently receiving on-line rape threats. A ballot final 12 months discovered that a third of feminine MPs have been threatened with sexual violence.
Of 60 politicians surveyed by Channel 4 Dispatches, almost all mentioned they had acquired abuse or threatening messages, and three quarters mentioned they had been threatened with bodily hurt.
Ms Harman, 73, instructed The Sunday Times that she would nonetheless encourage ladies to enter politics.
She mentioned: “But is the reply for girls to drop out of politics? No. The answer is to struggle again, and create a new norm the place ladies’s voices in politics should not the reason for outrage amongst misogynists, but the place misogynists are silenced as a result of they know that the ladies are doing what they’re elected to do.
“Democracy depends on ladies being a part of it. So the answer is to name it out, to problem it as undemocratic — and never banter — and to ensure persons are prosecuted and ladies have correct safety.”
Ms Harman has introduced that she won’t be standing for the celebration on the subsequent election. Her husband, the Labour MP Jack Dromey died final 12 months aged 73.
She mentioned that being widowed has come as a shock. “Most women who are married are going to end up as widows, and yet to all of us it comes as a shock,” she mentioned: “I felt, why did no person ever inform me I was going to be a widow?
“Actually, we might spend many a long time of our life not in a partnership. My mum lived for 30 years after Dad died. So it could be very odd that it ought to be a shock. Somebody ought to put in writing a widows’ handbook.”
