New Minister for Small Business

Margaret Hodge has been appointed the new DTI Minister with a wide ranging portfolio which includes small businesses.

Under the title, Minister of State for Industry and the Regions, her brief is described as 'overall responsibility for Business and Enterprise Group issues including enterprise, growth and business investment; strengthening regional economies; Small Business Service; Company Law Reform Bill; and Companies House.'

However one small business group sees this move as a downgrading of the importance of small businesses. Chief Executive of the Forum of Private Business Nick Goulding believes smaller businesses are in danger of being buried along with their new Minister Margaret Hodge.

He said: "Even the Department for Trade and Industry has marginalised the role, leaving the details absent from their website. I have written to the Minister asking that, in fulfilling this role, she will be instrumental in raising the profile of small firms within government."

Controversy

Margaret Hodge MP Between May 2005 and May 2006 she was Minister of State at the Department for Work & Pensions with responsibility for Work and Welfare Reform.

Prior to this she was the first ever Minister for Children Young People & Families between 2003 and 2005. It was in this role that she experienced her most controversial time when she was involved in a furore about a man who accused her of being ultimately responsible for abuse he suffered as a child in a home overseen by Mrs Hodge as leader of Islington Council.

She was further drawn into the controversy by responding to the man in a letter which referred to him as 'extremely disturbed'. The man concerned then passed the letter to the press which planned to publish it, only to be judicially restrained from doing so at the instruction of Mrs Hodge. The letter was eventually published, and Mrs Hodge was forced to publicly apologise, contribute to a charity of the man's choosing and pay his legal costs.

Background

She has also held Government posts as the Minister for Lifelong Learning and Higher Education, and Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Education and Employment with responsibility for child care, nursery education, Disabled People, Millennium Volunteers and equal opportunities in employment.

Before becoming MP for Barking, Mrs Hodge was a councillor in the London Borough of Islington for over 20 years and was Leader of the Council from 1982 till 1992. She has also held a range of offices which have included the Chair of the Association of London Authorities and Deputy chair of the Association of Metropolitan Authorities.

After her period as Leader of Islington she worked as a public sector consultant with Price Waterhouse Coopers. During that time she was a member of the Local Government Commission, on the board of UCL Hospital Trust and Chair of Circle 33 Housing Trust. She was also a Visiting Fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research.

She is a former Chair of the Fabian Executive Committee and patron of several local charities. She is a strong Blairite and lists her main areas of policy interest as education, the reform of public services, equality issues and especially gender issues and democratic renewal.