The Right Honourable

The Lady Walney
Hardman chairing a Policy Exchange debate, September 2014
Born (1986-05-05) 5 May 1986
Camden, London, England
Alma materUniversity of Exeter
OccupationJournalist
Known forAssistant editor, The Spectator
Spouse
​
​
(m. 2021)​
Children1

Isabel Hardman, Lady Walney (born 5 May 1986),[1] is a British political journalist and the assistant editor of The Spectator. In 2015, she was named Journalist of the Year at the Political Studies Association's annual awards.

Early life

Born in Camden, Hardman is the daughter of Michael Hardman, the first chairman and one of the four founders of the Campaign for Real Ale.[2] She attended St Catherine's School, Bramley, and Godalming College, before graduating from the University of Exeter with a first-class degree in English literature in 2007.[3][4] While at university, Hardman worked as a freelance journalist for The Observer.[5] She completed a National Council for the Training of Journalists course at Highbury College in 2009.[4]

Career

Hardman began her career in journalism as a senior reporter for Inside Housing magazine. She then became assistant news editor at PoliticsHome, moving to The Spectator in 2012. Alongside The Spectator, Hardman wrote a weekly column for the Evening Standard[6] on nature in London from 2020, until 2021.

Currently, she is an assistant editor of The Spectator.[7] Elsewhere, she writes a monthly column for the i paper[8] on health policy. In radio, she is a presenter of the BBC Radio 4 programme Week in Westminster[3]and in early July 2023, she became Political Commentator at Times Radio.

In television, she has appeared on programmes such as Question Time,[9] The Andrew Marr Show and Have I Got News for You.[10][11]

Hardman has also written books. In 2018, she wrote Why We Get The Wrong Politicians, this was followed by The Natural Health Service, in 2020, and Fighting for Life in 2023.[12][13][14]

In regard to accolades, in September 2014, GQ magazine named her as one of their 100 most connected women in Britain,[3] and in December 2015, she was named "Journalist of the Year" at the Political Studies Association's annual awards.[15] Why We Get The Wrong Politicians won the award for best political book by a non-parliamentarian at the Parliamentary Book Awards 2018. That year, it was also shortlisted for the Waterstones Book of the Year award and the Orwell Prize. [16]

Personal life

In April 2016, Hardman tweeted that a male member of Parliament had referred to her as "the totty" and that she had reported him to the whips. She was not intending to name the man[17] who was subsequently revealed to be the Conservative MP Bob Stewart.[18]

Hardman has written about suffering from depression, and in October 2016 wrote that she had stopped working temporarily due to anxiety and depression.[19] She has said that, in 2017, she was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, due to a serious trauma in her personal life.[20] She wrote that her recovery was partly down to time spent outdoors: she is a cold-water swimmer, and in 2019 ran the London Marathon for Refuge, raising £37,000 for the charity.

Hardman began a relationship with the politician John Woodcock in summer 2016.[21][22] In November 2019, Woodcock announced he and Hardman were expecting a child.[23] Hardman gave birth to a son on 12 May 2020.[24] On 30 July 2021, the couple married in a small ceremony at Barrow-in-Furness's register office.[25] This gave Hardman the title Lady Walney as the wife of a baron.

Bibliography

  • Hardman, Isabel (2018), Why We Get the Wrong Politicians, Atlantic Books, London, UK ISBN 978-1782399735
  • Hardman, Isabel (2020), The Natural Health Service, Atlantic Books, London, UK ISBN 978-1786495907
  • Hardman, Isabel (2023), Fighting for Life, Viking, Edinburgh, UK ISBN 978-0241504345

References

  1. ↑ Hardman, Isabel [@IsabelHardman] (5 May 2017). "People who don't make a massive deal of their birthdays -even random ones like a 31st, for instance - are in my view quite odd" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  2. ↑ Hardman, Isabel (31 December 2015). "The honours system is entrenching elitism in British society by rewarding political work". The Independent. Retrieved 26 April 2016.
  3. 1 2 3 "GQ and Editorial Intelligence's 100 Most Connected Women 2014". GQ.
  4. 1 2 "Isabel Hardman". National Council for the Training of Journalists. Retrieved 6 April 2021.
  5. ↑ Hardman, Isabel (17 September 2006). "Are students getting value for their £9,000 ?". The Observer. Retrieved 26 April 2016.
  6. ↑ "Isabel Hardman | Evening Standard". www.standard.co.uk. Retrieved 7 March 2021.
  7. ↑ "Isabel Hardman". Spectator Blogs.
  8. ↑ "Isabel Hardman , Author at inews.co.uk". inews.co.uk. Retrieved 7 March 2021.
  9. ↑ "Westminster political week round up with Isabel Hardman". BBC News. 13 December 2013. Retrieved 26 April 2016.
  10. ↑ 7 October 2022 https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/live/bbcone?rewindTo=current
  11. ↑ HaveIGotNewsForYou [@haveigotnews] (13 October 2017). "Tonight @RichardAyoade hosts #HIGNFY, with guest panellists @IsabelHardman and Andy Hamilton. @BBCOne, 9pm" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  12. ↑ Behr, Rafael. "Fighting for Life by Isabel Hardman; Our NHS by Andrew Seaton review – the NHS at 75". The Guardian.
  13. ↑ Kellaway, Kate. "The Well Gardened Mind by Sue Stuart-Smith; The Natural Health Service by Isabel Hardman – review". The Guardian.
  14. ↑ Rawnsley, Andrew. "Why We Get the Wrong Politicians by Isabel Hardman review – the travails of being an MP". The Guardian.
  15. ↑ Nelson, Fraser (1 December 2015). "The Spectator's Isabel Hardman named Journalist of the Year". The Spectator. Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  16. ↑ "Why We Get the Wrong Politicians". atlantic-books.co.uk/.
  17. ↑ "MP apologises for calling female political journalist 'totty'". The Daily Telegraph. 13 April 2016. Retrieved 15 April 2016.
  18. ↑ Allegretti, Aubrey (14 April 2016). "Bob Stewart MP Dismisses Row Over 'Totty' Slur As 'Political Correctness'". The Huffington Post. Retrieved 15 April 2016.
  19. ↑ Hardman, Isabel. "How we do (and don't but should) treat depression". Medium. Retrieved 31 October 2016.
  20. ↑ Harman, Isabel (28 December 2020). "Giving birth seemed to spell disaster for my mental health. Were my anxieties unfounded?". The Guardian. Retrieved 28 December 2020.
  21. ↑ Isabel Hardman,, 'Medium', 30 March 2018
  22. ↑ Dickson, Annabelle (13 September 2017). "Westminster's power couples". POLITICO. Retrieved 30 March 2018.
  23. ↑ Woodcock, John [@JZWoodcock] (4 November 2019). "I've decided not to re-stand in the general election because @IsabelHardman and I are having a baby" (Tweet). Retrieved 4 November 2019 – via Twitter.
  24. ↑ Hardman, Isabel [@IsabelHardman] (13 May 2020). "Our son, Jacob Arran Henry Woodcock, arrived safely last night" (Tweet). Retrieved 3 April 2021 – via Twitter.
  25. ↑ Taylor, Dan (1 August 2021). "Lord Walney 'over the moon' after marrying Isabel Hardman". The Mail. Retrieved 24 August 2021.
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