During the
First World War, Horsbrugh pioneered a travelling kitchen scheme in
Chelsea, London, which gained sufficient renown as to warrant an invitation to bring the kitchen to
Buckingham Palace one lunch hour to entertain
Queen Mary, who approved particularly of the sweets. Horsbrugh was a
Member of Parliament (MP) for
Dundee from 1931 until her defeat in 1945. Her victory in 1931 was a surprising result, and she was the first woman to represent the city in the
House of Commons and the first Conservative to be elected as a Member of Parliament for Dundee since the city gained its own constituency in 1832. At the time of her election, Dundee had not yet elected a female councillor. In 1936 she became the first woman to move the Address in reply to the
King's Speech, following which she was interviewed for television, in the process becoming the first member of parliament to appear on that medium. She unsuccessfully contested
Midlothian and Peebles in
1950 and was elected in the delayed poll at
Manchester Moss Side, sitting from 1950 until her retirement in 1959. Upon retirement, she was elevated to the
House of Lords, as a
life peer with the title
Baroness Horsbrugh, of Horsbrugh in the
County of Peebles, where she sat until her death. She held ministerial office in the wartime coalition governments as
Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (1939–45), and
Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food (1945). She was only the second woman to hold a ministerial post in a Conservative-led government following
Katherine, Duchess of Atholl. As Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health, 1939–45, she was responsible for arranging the evacuation of schoolchildren from major cities during the war. Following her return to the House of Commons, she was the first woman to hold a Cabinet post in a Conservative government, and only the third woman, after
Bondfield and
Wilkinson to be appointed as a Cabinet minister in British history (1953–1954), having been appointed
Minister of Education in 1951. She also served as a delegate to the
Council of Europe and
Western European Union from 1955 to 1960. As part of her lifelong championing of social welfare issues, Horsbrugh took a marked interest in child welfare and introduced, as a
private member, the bill which became the Adoption of Children (Regulation) Act 1939. Horsbrugh also carried out a great deal of preparatory work on the scheme which eventually became the
National Health Service. In 1945, she was a British delegate to the
San Francisco Conference which established the
United Nations. == Awards ==