40 OVER 40 Baroness Lola Young
#22
Baroness Lola Young, OBE
Baroness Young of Hornsey, Author
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
Baroness Lola Young OBE is an incredible change maker actively making a difference to lives as a crossbench peer in the House of Lords.
Lola has recently published a memoir detailing her life from being brought up in care in the 1950s to becoming a crossbench peer in 2004 sitting in the House of Lords as Baroness Young of Hornsey. She's also received an OBE for services to British Black History.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
She was placed in care as an 8 week old baby to an elderly white widow who tragically passed away when Lola was just 14 years old. Living in care in the 50s and 60s, in a predominantly white London neighbourhood with a white foster carer presented tough challenges but then her foster mother died and Lola was suddenly thrust into the system and into a children's home a long way out from her school. At 18, and no longer the responsibility of the council and having not made the grades for university, she turned her life around by finding work in a children's home and as an administrator and went on to train as an actor. She then made it to university and became an academic.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
Her life in care has made her see how systems are often designed to perpetuate the system, rather than serve the people who encounter it and this is a thread that drives much of her work in the House of Lords. She is founding co-chair of the all-party parliamentary groups on Ethics and Sustainability for Fashion and Sport, Modern Slavery and Human Rights. She's also been on a number of select committees, including one on Sexual Violence in Conflict Zones which addressed the vulnerability of traumatised women and girls. She really is one of a kind and I can't thank her enough for being part of the 40 OVER 40 project.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
What’s been your greatest achievement since becoming a member of the House of Lords?
There’s so much that’s happened that I’m grateful to have been a part of since joining the House of Lords—overall it’s learning about, and being involved in the struggle to raise awareness of and to eliminate forced labour in supply chains.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
What has your experience as a woman and also a woman of colour been like in the House of Lords? What’s the culture like and has it changed at all since you’ve been there?
It’s impossible to sum up in one tidy paragraph what that experience has been like. There are peaks and troughs, ups and downs as there are for so many people who experience racism and discrimination. That doesn’t stop because you’ve achieved a certain status in society. As in other situations, sometimes discriminatory behaviour is blatant, at other times a bit more subtle, sometimes you’re not even sure about something that was said or what just happened.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
Did you have any role models growing up? If so who and what did they teach you?
The concept of role models didn’t exist when I was young, and if I’d been looking for Black people on whom to model myself, I would have been out of luck. I was the child who immersed herself in books and tried to cull information about how the world worked from various people around me.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
Why did you decide to write your book and what if anything have you learned from the process?
It took me years to be decisive about writing a memoir that focused on my early life, decades really. I learnt about myself and how I respond to difficult situations, though that wasn’t just about the book—the rest of my life carried on and I had some testing experiences unrelated to the writing. I also learned that there was a significant number of people who related to what I’d written even though they’d been brought up under different circumstances.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
If you could go back and give your teenage self some advice, what would it be?
I’d be more likely to ask my teenage self to help me out now! Seriously though, I’d just say hang on and don’t give up on achieving contentment, and feeling settled.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
This project focuses on women over 40. Do you have any words of wisdom for women entering this phase in their life?
Not so much wisdom as an observation: establish your own norms and values, and try not to allow ‘bad actors’ blight your self confidence through telling you, for example, what ‘age appropriate’ clothing you should wear; what kind of music you should listen. Anyone who says, ‘at your age…’ challenge their thinking, and work out for yourself what is appropriate for the woman you are.
Lola Youngby Jenny Smith
Thank you Lola for being part of the 40 OVER 40 project.
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