Natalie Fleet says she has stepped down as safeguarding minister after finding the role “overwhelmingly triggering”, telling the BBC that it was making her ill.
The Labour MP, who was groomed and raped as a teenager, added she told the team of new Prime Minister Andy Burnham that she “sadly couldn’t stay” in the job.
Fleet described it as the “bravest thing I’ve ever done” and offered her support to her successor.
She was appointed to the role on 12 May this year following the resignation of Jess Phillips, who said opportunities for progress had been “stalled and delayed” under the leadership of then-Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer.
Announcing her departure on the social media platform X, external, Fleet said: “Honour of lifetime to be minister for safeguarding. Quickly found contents overwhelmingly triggering.”
She added: “Victims deserve someone at their best.”
She told BBC News the nature of the role as safeguarding minister means “you hear the worst of humanity”, saying: “I understand what it is like not to be seen and not to be heard.”
“I know how important this job is and I know how much it needs a good and competent minister. It quickly became apparent how ill it was making me.”
She received support from the Home Office while in post, she said.
“But even with that [support] the nature of the job means that you hear the worst of humanity.
“Anybody would struggle hearing that but not everyone would react in the same way as someone who has gone through what I have.
“For me it is one of the most important jobs in government. It was the honour of my life to be able to do it.
“Nothing can compare to being asked to make a difference to the lives of women and girls. It was incredible.”
Fleet was elected MP for Bolsover in July 2024, succeeding Conservative Mark Fletcher. From 1970 until 2019, the seat was held by Labour stalwart Dennis Skinner.
She has spoken openly about her experiences as a teenager, including in an interview with GB News in 2024.
Fleet said she became pregnant at the age of 15 after being groomed and raped by an older man, adding she has “weekly nightmares” about what she said happened to her.
“I didn’t know we were having unprotected sex,” she told the broadcaster. “I was a child and (it) is statutory rape.”
The MP said she fell pregnant and gave birth to her daughter, who she described as the “absolute love of my life”.
In her maiden speech in the House of Commons in October 2024, Fleet said it was her “duty” to speak up for women in her Derbyshire constituency “whose stories are not being told”.
Source:
www.bbc.co.uk
