International Women’s Day

Baroness Casey of Blackstock Excerpts

Friday 6th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Casey of Blackstock (CB)]

My Lords and fellow Baronesses, it is with utter joy that I welcome my noble friend Lady Paul of Shepherd’s Bush into the House today. May she be the first Tracey but not the last. My noble friend is, as I think noble Lords from across the Benches will now have gathered, another trooper from the McDonagh school of politicians and political life—you could almost call it the best stable going.

My noble friend has had a lifetime of public service dedicated to her political party. I often feel that in public life we forget how important political parties of all different types and organisations are. People often dedicate their lives to them, and without them we would not have a flourishing democracy. I think it is important that we always recognise that. People who were below stairs are now above stairs. People who were behind the scenes are now in front of the scenes. The back room has become the front room, and that is a really important part of political life and our democracy. I thank all the noble Baronesses here today from across all the Benches for their good work supporting our democracy.

My noble friend Lady Paul of Shepherd’s Bush has already shown today in her speech her extraordinary determination to bring both intellect and heart into this Chamber. I have worked with her in many different guises, and I want just to alight on two. For the last 10 years she has worked in the space of counterterrorism and dealing with extremism. She has already today shown how important that work is, how it knits our fabric of life together, and that without it we do not enjoy our safety and our security. But in and among it, my noble friend did not mention today that she has driven a lot of the work to inform support to the individuals and families whose lives have been traumatically affected and changed because of extremism and terrorism. That shows, more than anything, alongside her work at the NCS, that Tracey will always bring those less fortunate to this Chamber with heart, with courage and with determination. I honour and salute her and the other maidens here today joining these Benches of formidable, wonderful and challenging women. She is most welcome and I am honoured to be of support to her.

Obviously, I also thoroughly enjoyed everybody else’s maiden speeches. I am slightly panicked by those who followed them; I do not feel that I have done as good a job as some of the others, but I always do my best. As always, I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Lloyd of Effra. I will be extremely grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Malvern, my former boss.

I know that noble Lords indulge me every single year by allowing me to read out the names of women killed in the last 12 months where the principal suspect is a man. This year I go ahead of my dear friend and honourable colleague next door, the Member for Birmingham Yardley, who will read out the list in the way she always has done and honour those women on 12 March.

With noble Lords’ support and agreement, I take this opportunity to read out the names, collated by the Femicide Census, of the women and girls aged 14 and above and two children who were killed either by a man or, in circumstances where the case is yet to be tried, where the principal suspect is a male. Before I begin, I want to pause and acknowledge that almost one in five of these women this year was killed by her own son—a ratio that is hard to countenance and is higher than is ever usually the case here in the United Kingdom.

So to the names: Suratchanee “Lat” Parks; Delia McInerney; Lucy Harrison; Laleh Zarejouneghani; Judith Law; Jane Riddell; Dawn Kerr; Victoria Adams; Simone Smith; Brigitta Rasuli; Anjela Chetty; Joanne Penney; Michelle Egge-Bailey; Carmenza Valencia-Trujillo; Rachel Dixon; Claire Anderson; Paramjit Kaur; Clare Burns; Sarah Reynolds; Hien Thi Vu; Rebekah Campbell; Paria Veisi; unnamed, 40s, killed on 17 April 2025; Tracey Davies; Pamela Munro; Aimee Pike; Elizabeth Tamilore “Tami” Odunsi; Nnenna Chima; Kathryn Perkins; Margaret McGowan; Ellen Cook; Rachael Vaughan; Marjama Osman; Yajaira Castro Mendez; Miriam MacDonald; Mary “Marie” Green; Mandy Riley; Samantha Murphy; Isobella “Izzy” Knight; Christina Alexander; Annabel Rook; Reanne Coulson; Nilani Nimalarajah; Irene Mbugua; unnamed, 40s, killed on 26 June 2025; Nila Patel; Sarah Montgomery; Angela Botham; Fortune Gomo; Phyllis Daly; Gwyneth Carter; Stephanie Blundell; Brenda Breed; Vanessa Whyte plus her two children, James aged 14 and Sara aged 13; Courtney Angus; Nkiru Chima; Kimberley Thompson; Shara Miller; Paris Kendall; Sufia Khatun; Zahwa Salah Mukhtar; Niwunhellage Dona Nirodha Kalapni Niwunhella; Sheryl Wilkins; Halyna Hoisan, also known as Lina; Tia Langdon; Ndata Bobb; Linner Sang; June Bunyan; Michelle Thomson; Ann Green; Shelley Davies; Anjanee Sandhir; Catalina Birlea; Chereiss Bailey; Sonia Exelby; Agne Druskienea; Michele Kennedy; Angela Shellis; Stephanie Irons; Dickiesa Nurse; Natalie Egan; Colleen Westerman; Katie Fox; Lainie Williams; Lili Stojanova; Xiaoqing Ke; Julie Wilson; Maria Saceanu; Lisa Smith; Janet Bowen; Samantha Lee; Lisa-Marie Hopkins; Gilly Livie; Tania Williams; Gloria De Lazzari; Victoria Hart; Lisa Denton; Vanessa Pountney-Chadha; Helen Rundle; Anam Rafay; Rita Rowley; Amaal Raytaan; Carla-Maria Georgescu; Helen Bird; Angela Clayton; Naomi MacIvor.

I beg the leave of the Chamber also to mark today the fifth anniversary of the death of Sarah Everard, raped, tortured and murdered by a serving police officer five years ago. May she and all the 106 women and two children named today rest in peace.