The Right Honourable Patricia Hewitt (born December 22 1948 in Canberra, Australia ) and educated at Newnham College, Cambridge, is an English politician.

From 1974-83 she was General Secretary of the UKs National Council for Civil Liberties (now Liberty), enduring long-term surveillance by MI5, revealed by Cathy Massiter , a former MI5 officer, in 1985. Joining the Labour Party in the 1970s, she was initially a follower of Tony Benn; she publicly condemned those left-wing MPs who had abstained in the deputy leadership election of 1981, helping give Denis Healey a narrow victory.

She was the Labour candidate in the marginal Leicester East constituency in the 1983 general election but did not win this seat. She was press secretary to Neil Kinnock and helped set up the Institute for Public Policy Research. After Labour's 1992 election defeat she became head of research with Andersen Consulting.

Hewitt finally entered Parliament as member for Leicester West in 1997, and was appointed first Economic Secretary at the Treasury and then Minister for Small Business and E-Commerce.

Since 2001 she has been Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and Minister for Women.

• Official, Number 10 biography

Publications

• About Time. The Revolution in Work and Family Life (Rivers Oram Press: London, 1993) (ISBN 1854890409).