Overview
- Her management, Cloud9 Management, confirmed her death on Friday, July 10 and asked for the family’s wish not to be contacted to be respected.
- Widdecombe served as a Conservative MP for Maidstone and later Maidstone and The Weald from 1987 until she stood down at the 2010 general election.
- She held ministerial roles under John Major, including prisons minister from 1995 to 1997, and made unsuccessful bids for Conservative leader in 2001 and Speaker in 2009.
- After campaigning for Vote Leave in 2016 she joined the Brexit Party in 2019, served as an MEP, and from 2023 worked as Reform UK’s immigration and justice adviser.
- Her later public profile included a memorable run on Strictly Come Dancing in 2010 and wide national media work, and senior Reform UK figures have paid tribute while no cause of death has been disclosed.