Two small paper flags wrapped around pins. On the left, the flag is light blue with back text which reads 'Mrs Baldwin's Appeal National Birthday Trust Fund'. The second flag is also light blue. Across the top is a grphic banner which reads 'Help Our Mothers'. In the centre is a illustration of a woman sat down and holding a baby. There is a white circle around the mother's head which gives out into rays of light, expressed as white and black lines. Below, more text reads 'With Anaethetics'.

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Event: ‘Help Our Mothers!’ Join us for our annual International Women’s Day lecture

A painted portrait of a woman seated. She looks off to the left of the painting. She is wearing a dark blue gown, a tiara, a pear choker and necklace, and a boach on her dress. Her left hand is in a long sleeved white glove, which is holding the other glove. Her right hand is resting over the chair's arm, and she wears a thick bracelet on that wrist. The woman is white with short, light hair. Her facial expression is neutral. The background of the painting is a soft abstract brown and grey. — Mrs Stanley Baldwin, Painting by Philip Alexius de Laszlo © Parliamentary Art Collection WOA 7630.

24th March 2022 at 6pm – Join us via Teams Live. Book your free ticket.

Lucy Baldwin’s Campaign for Women

For the 9th annual Speaker’s Advisory Committee on Works of Art International Women’s Day lecture, Dr Susan Williams will speak about Lady Lucy Baldwin’s campaign to improve women’s care during childbirth.

In 1928, almost one in 200 women in Britain lost their lives through childbirth. Lucy Baldwin regarded this rate of death as an unacceptable evil. She made full use of her position as the Prime Minister’s wife to improve maternal welfare. She challenged the widespread prejudice against pain relief in labour and led a national campaign to make anaesthesia available to all women, regardless of income.

In 1936 Lucy Baldwin saw the culmination of a campaign in which she took a leading role – the passing of legislation to create a national service of midwives. This lecture tells the remarkable story of her crusade for mothers and of its impact on policy and public opinion.

About the speaker

Dr Susan Williams is a senior research fellow in the School of Advanced Study, University of London. Her many books of history include Ladies of Influence, which features Lucy Baldwin; Colour Bar, the story of Botswana’s independence from Britain, which became the major film ‘A United Kingdom’; Who Killed Hammarskjöld?; and White Malice: The CIA and the Neocolonisation of Africa (2021).

How to join the event

National Birthday Trust Fund, flags for ‘hel. Credit: Wellcome Collection. Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Dr Williams will deliver her lecture to a small group of Parliamentary passholders at Westminster and you are invited to join online as part of a much wider audience.

Book your free ticket. The event takes place on 24th March 2022 at 6pm.

The event lasts for 75 minutes in total, and you can ask questions via the chat function. These will be put to Dr Williams at the end.

This online event and will be hosted on Microsoft Teams Live Events. You can access this through web browsers like Chrome, Firefox or Microsoft Edge. Safari is not currently supported. You do not need a Microsoft account to join the event. We will send full details of how to join the event online following registration.

If you can’t join us live, keep an eye out on our YouTube Playlist, where we will post a recording of the lecture.

Find out more about our portrait of Lady Baldwin here.

March 15, 2022