Background
Rosemary Allen was born in Nottingham and educated at Bilborough Grammar School there, and at the University of Birmingham, where she graduated in Social Sciences and History in 1967.
Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom
Rosemary Allen was born in Nottingham and educated at Bilborough Grammar School there, and at the University of Birmingham, where she graduated in Social Sciences and History in 1967.
University of Birmingham.
After briefly becoming a teacher, she worked as a freelance market research consultant. Barnes was selected as Social Democratic Party candidate for Greenwich in December 1986 after the previous candidate stood down, saying he did not want to be a "paper candidate" because the local Social Democratic Party had decided to concentrate its efforts on keeping John Cartwright"s seat in Woolwich. On Christmas Eve 1986, the Labour Member of Parliament for the constituency (Guy Barnett) died, precipitating a by-election.
Her husband, who in 1996 had become an Social Democratic Party local councillor in Greenwich, acted as her agent at the subsequent 1987 general election four months later when she was returned.
She retained her seat with a lower majority. After the election, with the Social Democratic Party split over whether to merge with the Liberal Party, Rosie Barnes strongly supported David Owen in his resistance to merger.
Her closeness to Owen led to her nickname "Rosie Groupie" in Private Eye. In the 1992 general election, despite being actively aided by the local Liberal Democrat party who did not put up a candidate against her and canvassed for her, she lost her seat to Nick Raynsford of the Labour Party.
After leaving politics Barnes became a charity director, first for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaeocologists at Birthright (which she renamed WellBeing), and subsequently as Chief Executive of the Cystic Fibrosis Trust which she joined in October 1996 and from which she retired in August 2010.In 2011 she accepted an invitation to become Patron of Child Health International, a charity dedicated to helping families affected by cystic fibrosis in former soviet bloc countries.
Barnes was awarded an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for services to health care in 2011.
She served on the Council for Social Democracy from 1982 as the delegate from Greenwich, and was an Social Democratic Party candidate in Woolwich in the Inner London Education Authority elections in May 1986. Becoming a political star at the general election by virtue of her "non-partisan" appeal, the Social Democratic Party decided to use Barnes prominently in its campaign. She was shown in soft focus in a Party political broadcast teaching her son the way to stroke a rabbit, an appearance which was heavily ridiculed.
49th United Kingdom Parliament. 50th United Kingdom Parliament]
Rosie Barnes became a member of Doctor Owen"s "continuing" Social Democratic Party, but when the party was disbanded in 1990 she continued to sit in Parliament as an "Independent Social Democrat".
