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|death_place =
|death_place =
|party = [[Labour Party (UK)|Labour]]
|party = [[Labour Party (UK)|Labour]]
|children = [[Olivia Blake]]
|children = 4, including [[Olivia Blake|Olivia]]
|residence = [[Otley]], [[West Yorkshire]]
|residence = [[Otley]], [[West Yorkshire]]
|education = [[Leeds Girls High School]]
|education = [[Leeds Girls High School]]

Revision as of 23:24, 29 December 2019

For the sociologist, see Judith Blake (sociologist).
Judith Blake
CBE
Leader of Leeds City Council
Assumed office
11 May 2015
Preceded byKeith Wakefield
Leeds City Councillor
for Middleton Park Ward
Assumed office
2004
Preceded byJack Dunn
Leeds City Councillor
for Hunslet Ward
In office
2002–2004
Preceded byMark Davies
Succeeded byWard abolished
Leeds City Councillor
for Weetwood Ward
In office
1996–2000
Preceded byAnn Castle
Succeeded byJames Souper
Personal details
Born
Judith Vivienne Parsons

July 1953 (age 70)
Leeds, England
Political partyLabour
Children4, including Olivia
Residence(s)Otley, West Yorkshire
EducationLeeds Girls High School
Alma materUniversity of Kent

Judith Vivienne Blake CBE (née Parsons) is a British Labour politician and the Leader of Leeds City Council since May 2015. She is also the first woman to hold the position.[1][2][3]

Personal life

Blake was born in July 1953 into a Methodist family in Leeds, of which both of her parents were doctors. She attended Leeds Girls High School until 1971 and then studied History at the University of Kent.[4][5] After university, she travelled the Middle East and her career also took her to live in both London and Birmingham. She returned to live in Otley in 1992.[6]

Blake has four children. Her youngest child, Olivia Blake, a former Deputy Leader of Sheffield City Council, was elected as the Member of Parliament for Sheffield Hallam in 2019.[7][8][9]

Career

Judith began her career in education and social policy, including teaching English to refugees whilst living in Birmingham in the 1980s.[7][6]

She served as an Otley town councillor,[7] and, except for a two-year gap after losing her seat in Weetwood at the 2000 city council election, has been an elected member of Leeds City Council since 1996.[2]

Judith served as the Deputy Leader of the Council for five years from 2010 to 2015. She was the Executive Cabinet Member for Children & Families during this period, overseeing the city's Children's Services' Ofsted rating change from “inadequate” to “good overall”.[2] She has been involved in a number of national legal campaigns, worked with education authorities in Yorkshire to raise school standards in the area, and worked on crises and issues with student grades and school placements throughout her career.[3]

She was elected as the first woman leader of the City Council in May 2015.[1] She currently chairs the Council's Executive Board, having also served on the boards for NHS Leeds and the West Yorkshire Police Authority too. In December 2015, she expressed the frustration of city residents in feeling that Prime Minister David Cameron was giving greater attention to more affluent southern counties during a period of severe flooding.[10]

Blake twice contested the Leeds North West constituency as a prospective parliamentary candidate for the 2005 and 2010 general elections, losing to Greg Mulholland of the Liberal Democrats.

In April 2019, Blake was appointed to the board of Northern Ballet.[11]

Awards

References

  1. ^ a b "Leeds City Council Elects Judith Blake as First Female Leader". BBC News. 11 May 2015. Retrieved 6 July 2017.
  2. ^ a b c "Clr Judith Blake: Power list 2016". Northern Power Women. Retrieved 24 November 2019.
  3. ^ a b "Councillor Judith Blake "Honoured" to be Leeds' First Ever Female Council Leader". Yorkshire Evening Post. 11 May 2015. Retrieved 6 July 2017.
  4. ^ "Judith Vivienne BLAKE". Companies House. Retrieved 15 December 2019.
  5. ^ "Judith reflects on an education which paved the way to a life in politics". Grammar School at Leeds. 24 May 2019. Retrieved 14 December 2019.
  6. ^ a b https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/news/the-next-best-thing-1-2045707
  7. ^ a b c "Judith Blake, Labour, Leeds North West". Telegraph & Argus. Retrieved 6 July 2017.
  8. ^ "Sheffield Hallam Parliamentary constituency". BBC News. BBC. Retrieved 5 December 2019.
  9. ^ Burn, Chris (9 May 2018). "'Fresh start' hope after Sheffield tree-felling council boss quits post". The Yorkshire Post. Retrieved 13 December 2019.
  10. ^ "As criticism rises, Cameron defends efforts to fight floods in England's north", The Boston Globe (December 29, 2015), p. A3.
  11. ^ "Northern Ballet appoints five new members to its Board of Directors". northernballet.com. Northern Ballet Limited. Retrieved 27 November 2019.
  12. ^ Jack, Jim (22 June 2017). "Queen's Honour for Otley resident and city council leader Judith Blake". Wharfedale Observer. Retrieved 27 November 2019. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)

External links

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