Margaret Hodge
British politician (born 1944)
Margaret Eve Hodge, Baroness Hodge of Barking (née Oppenheimer, formerly Watson; born 8 September 1944), is a British politician and life peer, who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Barking from 1994 to 2024. A member of the Labour Party, she was previously Leader of Islington London Borough Council from 1982 to 1992. She has held a number of ministerial roles and served as chair of the Public Accounts Committee from 2010 to 2015.
Hodge was born to German Jewish parents who fled the Nazis during the Holocaust, and her father was the co-founder of steel firm Stemcor. She was a councillor on Islington Council from 1973 to 1994, was chair of the Housing Committee, and then Council Leader from 1982 to 1992. Hodge later apologised for failing to ensure that allegations of serious child abuse in council-run homes were sufficiently investigated and for libelling a complainant.
Hodge was elected to parliament in a 1994 by-election. She was appointed Junior Minister for Disabled People in 1998 and promoted to Minister for Universities in 2001, subsequently becoming the first Children's Minister in 2003, joining the Privy Council. In 2005, Hodge became Minister of State for Work. Hodge served as Minister of State for Culture and Tourism from 2007 to 2008 and 2009 until Labour was defeated at the 2010 general election.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Margaret Hodge” as british politician (born 1944). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as british politician (born 1944). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q688913. VIAF identifies the subject as 4178859. The Library of Congress control number is n95045366. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1944, 1994, 2024 and 1982.
A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Margaret Hodge” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.