Betty Boothroyd

Boothroyd's Speaker's shoe in the Women's Library

In 1987, following the general election that year, she became a Deputy Speaker under the Speaker Bernard Weatherill. She served in this role for five years. In 1992 she was elected Speaker, being the first woman ever to hold the position. There was some debate as to whether or not Boothroyd should wear the traditional Speaker's wig upon her election. She chose not to but also stated that any subsequent Speakers would be free to choose to wear the wig.[8] In 1993, the Government won a vote on the Social Chapter of the Maastricht Treaty due to her casting vote (exercised in accordance with Speaker Denison's rule). However, it was subsequently discovered that her casting vote was not required, as the votes had been miscounted and the Government had won by one vote. She was keen to get young people interested in politics, and in the 1990s made an appearance as a special guest on the BBC's Saturday morning children's programme Live & Kicking.

On 12 July 2000, following Prime Minister’s Questions, she declared to the House of Commons that she would resign as Speaker after the summer recess. Tony Blair, then Prime Minister, paid tribute to her as "something of a national institution". Blair's predecessor, John Major, described her as an "outstanding Speaker".[9] She resigned as Speaker and as an MP by accepting an appointment to the position of Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds on 23 October 2000.[10]

Boothroyd was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Civil Law (Hon DCL) by the City University London in 1993. Boothroyd was chancellor of the Open University from 1994 until October 2006, and has donated some of her personal papers to the University's archives. In March 1995, she also was awarded an honorary degree from the Open University as Doctor of the University (DUniv). Since 1999, she is an Honorary Fellow of St Hugh's College, Oxford.[11] Two portraits of Boothroyd have been part of the parliamentary art collection since 1994 and 1999.[12][13]

On 15 January 2001, she was created a life peer, the first of the millennium, taking as her title Baroness Boothroyd, of Sandwell in the County of West Midlands,[14] and her autobiography was published in the same year. In April 2005, she was appointed to the Order of Merit (OM), an honour in the personal gift of the Queen.[15]

Boothroyd is an Honorary Fellow of the Society of Light and Lighting (Hon. FSLL) since 2009,[16][17] and she is an Honorary Fellow of St Edmund's College, Cambridge.[18] Boothroyd is furthermore the Patron of the Jo Richardson Community School in Dagenham, East London, England, as well as being President of NBFA Assisting the Elderly. She was also, for a period, Vice President of the Industry and Parliament Trust.

In January 2011, Boothroyd posited that Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg's plans for some members to the upper house to be directly elected could leave Britain in constitutional disarray: "It is wantonly destructive. It is destruction that hasn’t been thought through properly.” Boothroyd said she was concerned that an elected Lords would rival the Commons, risking power-struggles between the two.[19]