| AdminHistory | (Vera) Joan Maynard, trade unionist and politician, was born in Easingwold, North Yorkshire on 5 July 1921. She was Labour Member of Parliament for the Sheffield Brightside constituency from 1974 - 1987 and a member of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Agriculture, 1975 - 1987. She died in Sowerby, North Yorkshire on 27 March 1998.
Coming from a working class background, she lobbied for causes of the left such as the establishment of a national minimum wage. Continual campaigning and a rigid adherence to socialist principles earned her the nickname of 'Stalin's Grandmother' although she always insisted she was not a communist. The journalist Andrew Alexander described her as 'Sheffield's answer to Rosa Luxemburg'. She gave up her seat in 1987 to look after her older brother and sister.
Maynard was heavily critical of the government's handling of Northern Ireland, particularly focusing on the rights of prisoners. She was involved in the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) movement, and was also a prominent commentator on the Apartheid regime in South Africa. In addition to these international issues, she was a champion for local agricultural issues; she was perhaps most famous for her campaign to end the tied-cottage system in British agriculture. After determined lobbying by Maynard, the Rent (Agricultural) Act (1976), which established a fair rent system for agricultural workers, was put on the statute book. The act gave agricultural workers security of tenure and brought them within the scope of the rent acts. |
| Description | This collection covers the years 1974 to 1983 dealing with Maynard's time as an MP for the Sheffield Brightside constituency. The documents are grouped into five sections:
1. General correspondence, 1975 - 1982 (MPA/1/1-4)
2. Constituency correspondence, 1977 - 1979 (MPA/2/1-7)
3. Case papers, 1980 - 1983 (MPA/3/1-6)
4. Subject files, 1974 - 1982 (MPA/4/1-67)
5. Parliamentary affairs, 1978 (MPA/5/1-3) |
| CustodialHistory | These items were deposited in six lots by Joan Mayard MP between 1978 and 1985. |