Emma Nicholson, Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne, born 1941, was the MP for Torridge and West Devon 1987‒97. Elected as a Conservative MP, she crossed the floor to join the Liberal Democrats in 1995. After losing her seat in 1997 she was created a life peer, and served as a Member of the European Parliament for South East England for ten years (1999‒2009). Interviewed in 2013 for the History of Parliament’s oral history project by our oral history project co-ordinator Dr Emmeline Ledgerwood, to mark Disability History Month Emmeline reflects on what the interview conveys about Baroness Nicholson’s experiences of hearing loss and how it affected her education and political life.

Emma Nicholson’s childhood was defined by growing up in a political family. Her father was Sir Godfrey Nicholson, Conservative MP for Morpeth (1931‒1935) and Farnham (1939‒1966) and her mother’s family were also politicians: “rafts of politicians going back a very large number of generations indeed. […] a large number of politicians rolled in and out of the house from time to time […] it was a small house and we just ran in and out and listened.” [Track 1, 00:10:32‒00:11:27]

That last sentence is misleading, for Nicholson’s childhood was also defined by both visual and hearing impairment. “My life went into a black hole when I was 11 or 10 when my eyes went wrong, but in that sense I was rescued by music because that was the only thing I could do that wasn’t reading … it’s just peculiar because it was also something that was also difficult because of my ears. [Track 2, 00:00:00‒ 00:00:17]

She goes on to explain that as a teenager she was diagnosed as having 90 per cent hearing loss.

For those people listening to the recording, and indeed as the person who conducted the interview, it is difficult to understand the nature of Nicholson’s hearing loss and how her sensory perceptions operate. Nicholson refers to this as being a common reaction from those she meets, giving as an example an account of a visit to the Mary Hare School, the largest school for deaf children in the UK, of which she is a Vice President. “Some of the parents complained to the head teacher that I obviously wasn’t deaf, that I was just a politician using it to get publicity, that I couldn’t be deaf because I behaved so normally. [….] I’m neither fish, fowl nor good red herring in a curious sort of way.” [Track 1, 00:28:17‒00:29:04]

The following exchange during the interview about Nicholson’s musical abilities (she studied at the Royal Academy of Music) reminds us of descriptions given by percussionist Evelyn Glennie about the physical sensations she experiences while performing.

Both accounts refer to dimensions of sensory perception that are beyond the grasp of people with unaffected hearing capacity.

On leaving the Royal Academy Nicholson was taken on by International Computers Ltd (ICL) to train as a computer programmer, where she applied her musical aptitude to the tasks they were given: “After about two weeks I suddenly realised that what they were trying to do was to write a fugue and they didn’t know how to write a fugue so I turned their language into my language and addressed it differently … I just turned it into music.” [Track 1, 00:43:20‒ 00:43:56]. Following ICL, Nicholson joined the Save the Children Fund, and it was during her time there that she embarked on the lengthy process of running for Parliament. Her first election campaign was in 1979 as the Conservative candidate in the safe Labour seat of Blyth, and this anecdote about speaking at a public meeting illustrates the difficulties encountered by disabled politicians in the political arena:

Academic studies show that disabled people seeking office are often hesitant to disclose their disabilities, corroborated by Nicholson’s comment that “it’s very difficult for many people […] but because disability is then used against you politically, people don’t want to admit. Why should they? It’s been very difficult admitting to being deaf.” [Track 2, 00:27:05‒00:27:23] However she goes on to say that after she was elected as an MP, “I made it plain immediately on about the first BBC programme that I could so people would be aware that I wasn’t hiding anything, the constituents particularly, I didn’t want to hide anything.” [Track 1, 00:26:30‒00:26:42].

She describes working in the Commons as “impossible, really, really, really difficult.” [Track 2, 00:25:22]. Similarly Jack Ashley (MP for Stoke-on-Trent South, 1966‒1992), wrote about the difficulty of adjusting to parliamentary life after suffering total hearing loss within two years of being elected: “[The Chamber] was transformed into a mysterious, menacing arena where I could be trapped into misunderstanding the arguments and passions which swiftly ebbed and flowed. […] Understanding debates was important, but other occasions, previously taken for granted, would now present major problems. To check a point made in debates I could always read Hansard, but there is no report of those informal discussions in corridors and tea-rooms which are as important to political understanding as formal debates.”

Just as Ashley’s deafness had a huge impact on his ability to navigate certain political spaces, so too did Nicholson’s hearing loss dictate how she operated politically.

After leaving the Commons, Nicholson became a Member of the European Parliament, describing why she was able to work much more effectively in Brussels than in the Westminster. “First of all because of the way the room is presented is different, you’re in a semi-circle so you can see people’s faces much more, not everyone but you can see an awful lot, and secondly because they made me vice-chair of the biggest committee [Foreign Affairs] so I could see people’s faces from the front up on the platform, and thirdly because there is simultaneous translation and so the head of the translation unit came to see me, I asked for him … so he then took the English section very seriously and trained them to fit me, it was hugely helpful, so I had a really good ten years there.” [Track 2, 00:25:52‒00:26:40].

In the interview Nicholson remembers the difficulties she encountered due to her deafness during internal party discussions about forming a coalition government following the May 2010 general election.

She goes on to reflect on her track record as an MP: “Undoubtedly I could have done better but that was almost 100 per cent dependent upon my hearing. I could have done much better had I been able to hear, but had I been able to hear I would have been a different person anyway and I’m not able to hear so within that I did loads.” [Track 5, 00:47:18‒00:47:41]

The History of Parliament’s oral history collection is enriched by Nicholson’s accounts of her disability and its impact on her capacity to operate in different political environments, yet as a deaf person Nicholson is limited in how she can access recordings such as these. This highlights one of the challenges for us as oral historians, making our collections as accessible as possible to users and researchers with hearing loss and other disabilities.

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Further reading:

Jack Ashley, Journey into Silence (The Bodley Head: 1973).

Elizabeth Evans & Stefanie Reher, ‘Disability and political representation: Analysing the obstacles to elected office in the UK’, International Political Science Review, 43 (5), (2022), pp. 697‒712. https://doi.org/10.1177/0192512120947458

Emma Nicholson, Secret Society: Inside – and Outside – the Conservative Party (Indigo: 1996).

Brad Rakerd, ‘On Making Oral Histories More Accessible to Persons with Hearing Loss’, The Oral History Review, 40 (1), (2013) pp. 67‒74. https://doi.org/10.1093/ohr/oht022