13 Facts About Susan Lawrence

Arabella Susan Lawrence was a British Labour Party politician, one of the earliest female Labour MPs.

Susan Lawrence was educated in London and at Newnham College, Cambridge.

Susan Lawrence joined the Fabian Society, becoming close to Sidney Webb, and especially to his wife Beatrice Webb.

Susan Lawrence was imprisoned for five weeks in Holloway Prison in 1921, but ultimately she and her fellow councillors' campaign succeeded, in that government passed a law to equalise Poor Law rates.

Susan Lawrence first stood, unsuccessfully, for Parliament at Camberwell North West at a by-election in 1920, but won East Ham North in the 1923 election which saw the first Labour government take office in the January of the following year.

Susan Lawrence was one of the first three female Labour MPs, alongside Dorothy Jewson and Margaret Bondfield, and the first woman elected to represent a London constituency.

The minority government lasted only nine months; following the Zinoviev letter, the Labour Party lost the election of October 1924 and Susan Lawrence was personally defeated.

However, the Conservative victor, Charles Williamson Crook, died only 18 months later and Susan Lawrence was easily re-elected at a by-election in April 1926.

In 1924, Susan Lawrence visited Soviet Russia and spent six months travelling widely.

Susan Lawrence was appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health in the second minority Labour Government elected in 1929.

In 1935, Susan Lawrence visited Palestine and was impressed by kibbutzim and Zionism in general.

Susan Lawrence subsequently tried, not very successfully, to persuade the Labour Party Conference that a socialist utopia was being created in Palestine which was benefitting Jewish and Arab workers alike.

Just before this finished its work in early 1937, Susan Lawrence wrote a memorandum for the Labour Party's Advisory Committee on Imperial Affairs, on whose Palestine sub-committee she sat, stressing the problems arising for the Arabs because Jewish development was going so far ahead.