Edwina Currie

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From 1975 until 1986, she was a Birmingham City Councillor for Northfield. In 1983, she stood for parliament as a Conservative Party candidate, and was elected as the member for South Derbyshire. Frequently outspoken, she was described as "a virtually permanent fixture on the nation's TV screen saying something outrageous about just about anything" and "the most outspoken and sexually interested woman of her political generation."

In September 1986, she became a Junior Health Minister. Among her comments over the next two years were—despite her not being religious—that "good Christian people" don't get AIDS, that old people who could not afford their heating bills should wrap up warm in winter and that northerners die of "ignorance and chips".

In 1988, a senior civil servant appointed television personality Jimmy Savile to head up a task force to run the Broadmoor psychiatric hospital. Currie subsequently rubber-stamped this decision. Savile was given extraordinary power and a set of keys with complete access to every part of the hospital. He mingled repeatedly with the 800 or so patients, many teenage girls, some severely disturbed and medicated. In 2012, after Savile's death, a police investigation concluded that he had possibly been one of Britain's most prolific sex offenders.

Currie was forced to resign as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health in December 1988, after she issued a warning about salmonella in British eggs. The statement that "most of the egg production in this country, sadly, is now affected with salmonella" sparked outrage among farmers and egg producers, and caused egg sales in the country to decline rapidly, by 60 percent. The controversy gained her the nickname "Eggwina".

The loss of revenue led to the slaughter of four million hens. Although the statement was widely interpreted as referring to "most eggs produced", in fact it related to the egg production flock; there was indeed evidence that a mid-1980s regulation change had allowed salmonella to get a hold in flocks.

There was particular anger in Northern Ireland where egg production is a significant part of the economy. At the Christmas party of the Industrial Development Board for Northern Ireland that year the featured dish was curried eggs. To make amends, in 1990, she began the National Egg Awareness Campaign.

Long after the furore died down, in 2001, it was revealed that a covered-up Whitehall report produced months after Currie's resignation found that there had been a "salmonella epidemic of considerable proportions".

In 1991, Currie became the first Conservative MP to appear on the BBC topical panel show Have I Got News for You. She appeared again two years later, in a special episode commemorating the release of Margaret Thatcher's memoirs, opposite fellow Liverpudlian (and Liverpool Institute alumnus) Derek Hatton.

During the 1992 general election campaign, Currie poured a glass of orange juice over Labour's Peter Snape shortly after an edition of the Midlands-based television debate show Central Weekend had finished airing. Speaking about the incident later, Currie said "I just looked at my orange juice, and looked at this man from which this stream of abuse was emanating, and thought 'I know how to shut you up.'"

After the 1992 general election, she declined a request from Prime Minister John Major to take up a position as Minister of State for the Home Office.

In February 1994 Currie, a member of the Tory Campaign for Homosexual Equality (TORCHE), tabled an amendment to the Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill to lower the age of consent for male homosexual sexual acts from 21 to 16, which would mean an equal age of consent with opposite-sex couples if it passed. This amendment was defeated by 307 votes to 280, although a subsequent amendment resulted in the reduction of the age of consent for male homosexual acts from 21 to 18; final equalisation with an age of consent at 16 was voted through parliament in late 2000, becoming law in January 2001. In a speech in the House of Commons Currie said, "it is time to seize our homophobic instincts and chuck them on the scrapheap of history, where they belong". In February 1994, Currie voted against the death penalty for murder, having previously voted and spoken in favour of it in July 1983; she had also supported it in June 1988 and December 1990.

In June 1994, she contested the European Parliament seat of Bedfordshire and Milton Keynes, but lost the seat to Labour's Eryl McNally by 94,837 votes to 61,628 votes. Currie was MP for South Derbyshire for 14 years; however, along with many other Tory MPs, she lost her parliamentary seat in the 1997 general election.

Currie attempted to be selected as a Conservative candidate for the European Parliament election of 1999, but was unsuccessful.

After nearly a quarter of a century away from politics, it was announced in February 2021 that Currie would contest her home ward of Whaley Bridge on Derbyshire County Council at that year's local elections. She was challenging the incumbent, Ruth George of the Labour Party. The race was notable for pitting two former MPs against one another in an election for a council seat. On 7 May, it was announced that Currie had failed in her bid to win the marginal seat, receiving only 1,878 votes to George's 2,544.

In 2022 Currie described Liz Truss as "charmless, graceless, brainless, and useless".

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