Xtra Diary: "Homes for Votes" Shirley Porter turns her life into a book - disgraced former council leader pens autobiography

Published: 24 June 2011
by JOSH LOEB

SHE was known as the most ruthless woman in local government – but is the life of Shirley Porter now one of indecision?

The Guardian’s diarist Hugh Muir reported last week that former city council leader Lady Porter (pictured) – disgraced in the “homes for votes” scandal of the late 1980s – has written her autobiography.

This is hardly news. According to the Mail’s Richard Kay, she’s had the manuscript on her desk since at least September 2009.

Back then, however, Lady Porter, who now divides her time between Park Lane and Tel Aviv, asserted that it would never grace the bookshelves. 

“I wrote the book to set the record straight and also because it acted as catharsis, and helped me to move on in my life,” she said at the time. 

But she added that friends and family had persuaded her to keep it close. Now, however, the forthright Lady has had a change of heart, allegedly telling friends that she’s so determined to publish she’ll print it herself if no one will take the script.

Whatever happened to “the lady’s not for turning”? 

These were, of course, the words of her friend and idol Margaret Thatcher, but let’s not forget that under Lady Porter, Westminster   Tories resolved to “neutralise” Labour’s Paul Dim­­old­enberg.