Baroness Corbett of Castle Vale (died 2026)

The Baroness  Corbett of Castle Vale died 17 August 2026, aged 88.

She was the widow of life peer Robin Corbett, Baron Corbett of Castle Vale (1933-2012) a Labour Party politician and journalist. Corbett sat in the House of Commons from 1974 to 1979 and then from 1983 to 2001, before being elevated to the House of Lords.

Baroness Corbett was born in Cape Town, as Valerie Rose Jonas, and married 1stly, 1965 [div.], Paul Grenville C. Hudson (1934-1991); and married 2ndly, in 1970, Robin Corbett (born 22 December, 1933), by whom she had issue.  

Her husband was elected Labour MP for Hemel Hempstead at the October 1974 general election, but he lost the seat at the general election in 1979. He then returned to IPC Magazines, working as a communications consultant until he returned to parliament in the 1983 general election, representing Birmingham Erdington. He held this seat until retiring from the House of Commons at the 2001 general election.

In the Commons, Robin Corbett served as Opposition Spokesman for Home Affairs (1979–1992), then for National Heritage, Broadcasting and Press until 1995. He was a Labour Party Whip from 1984 until 1987, and Chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee from 1999 to 2001. His Private Member's Bill, still law today, granted lifetime anonymity for rape victims in court and media.

Corbett was raised to the peerage for life, 5 July, 2001, and was gazetted in the name style and title of Baron Corbett of Castle Vale, of Erdington in the County of West Midlands. He died 19 February, 2012.

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