Diana Maddock, Baroness Maddock


Diana Margaret Maddock, Baroness Maddock, Lady Beith was a British Liberal Democrat politician.

Education and early career

Diana Maddock was educated at Shenstone Training College and Portsmouth Polytechnic and was a teacher of English as a foreign language until starting a family and becoming involved in politics in the mid-1970s.

Political career

Maddock joined the Liberal Party in 1976, and was elected to Southampton City Council in 1984. During this time, she was leader of the Liberal Democrat group on the council. She unsuccessfully contested Southampton Test at the 1992 general election, coming third. She was elected as Member of Parliament for Christchurch at a by-election in 1993 that was caused by the death of Robert Adley, but lost the seat at the 1997 election to the Conservative candidate Christopher Chope.
She was created a life peer as Baroness Maddock, of Christchurch in the County of Dorset on 30 October 1997. From 1998 to 2000, she was President of the Liberal Democrats.
In 2005, she was elected a member of Northumberland County Council for Berwick North Division and in 2007 also to Berwick-upon-Tweed Borough Council for Edward Ward.
Maddock did not re-stand for election to the County Council at the expiry of her term in 2008 and the Borough Council was abolished in 2009 and absorbed into Northumberland County Council.

Personal life

She married Lord Beith, formerly MP for Berwick-upon-Tweed, in 2001. She and her husband were one of the few couples who each held titles in their own right. She died on 26 June 2020 aged 75 at her home in Berwick-upon Tweed, Northumberland.