Baroness May Blood
Born: May 26th, 1938
Died: October 21st, 2022
Belfast-born Baroness May Blood, who has died aged 84, was one of those rare individuals who was genuinely appreciated by politicians across all parties in Northern Ireland and beyond.
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A passionate trade unionist, fearless community activist, tireless campaigner for integrated education and founding member of Northern Ireland’s Women’s Coalition, May Blood used her exceptional skills and formidable character to secure change to many people’s lives in Northern Ireland.
In 1995, she was awarded a Member of the British Empire (MBE) for her work in industrial relations and equal opportunities. She later described the presentation of her MBE by Queen Elizabeth as the proudest moment of her life. She also held honorary degrees from Ulster University, Queen’s University and the Open University.
Blood was president of the Labour Party in Northern Ireland for many years and encouraged by late Northern Ireland Secretary, Mo Mowlam, she became the first woman in Northern Ireland to be given a life peerage, taking the title Baroness Blood of Blackwatertown. She remained a Labour Party peer in the House of Commons from 1999 to 2018 and never missed a week when the House was sitting.
The east Belfast MP, Gavin Robinson said that Blood was one of Belfast’s true characters who had classic city charm. “She strived for social justice, scorned sectarianism and as small as she was, stood up to anyone who strayed in her way.”
As a community activist, Blood worked hard to upskill young people to give them better employment opportunities whilst also bringing much needed jobs to her local community. She also brought the Sure Start early education programme to the Shankill area and she often said that “education is your passport to life”.
Paul Caskey, head of campaign at the Integrated Education Fund (IEF) who frequently travelled abroad with Blood to raise the profile of integrated education [where Protestant and Catholic children attend the same school] in Northern Ireland said that Blood was an inspiration to all who knew her. “May had a unique ability to transcend the sectarian division in this society and she devoted her life to the entire community and bringing people together,” he said.
Although she had originally rejected the idea of integrated education as a middle-class concept irrelevant to the communities she operated in, in 2001, she agreed to become a voluntary fundraiser and later campaign chairwoman for the IEF. Over the next 17 years, she helped raise £15 million for the non-profit making organisation.
She said, “I think if you get kids mixing from an early age, they learn about one another’s culture so it doesn’t become a big fear factor that can be used to drive people apart.”
May (she was baptised Mary) Blood was one of six children who grew up off Grosvenor Road near the Shankill Road in Belfast. Her father William was a shipyard worker and her mother, Mary a cook. She left Linfield Secondary School at the age of 14 to go to work in the Blackstaff linen mill in West Belfast. She first trained as a cutter and later became a mill supervisor, but her membership of the union gave her access to further education. She became a popular shop steward and later advanced to becoming a convener of the regional committee of the Transport and General Workers’ Union.
In her autobiography, Watch My Lips, I’m Speaking (Gill & Macmillan), she described how she accidentally cut off the top of her finger with a knife and how when one of her friends drove her to the Royal Victoria Hospital, the nurse found it hard to believe her name was Blood. “All my life, people have got fun out of my name,” she later told an interviewer.
The advent of the Troubles was a deeply traumatic experience for her as she watched in disbelief and horror how the mixed community she grew up in disintegrated under the impact of sectarian violence. Her own family was burnt out of their home by fellow Protestants for defending their Catholic neighbours. The family moved into a new estate at the top of the Shankill Road where Blood’s community work was centred. She herself was often threatened and her car was destroyed twice.
During her time working at the Blackstaff Mill until its closure in 1989, she campaigned for better pay, shorter hours, holiday pay and Saturday overtime rates for the largely female workforce. In the 1990s, she ran a training project for the long-term unemployed men in the Shankill Road area as part of the Greater Shankill Partnership.
During this time, she was a key figure in the formation of the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition, the cross community political party which went on to play a significant role in the peace talks which led to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.
Her Christian faith was important to her and many have said that her values of kindness and compassion emerged from her religious values. The Most Reverend John McDowall, Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland said that Blood’s concern for people sprang from seeing and experiencing the very poor living conditions in postwar Belfast.
“This led her to an early involvement in the trade union movement and into wider social and political activism ... And she could be found where women so often have been in the unfinished work of peace in Ireland. She was front and central to this work — where more timid spirits were wary to tread.”
May Blood is survived by her niece, Mary, her grandniece, Heather and her grandnephew, Mathew.