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Jean Cox, right, with her husband, Oliver |
Standing up for the rights of others
JEAN Cox, who has died aged 84, was a life long socialist who will be remembered for her brilliance at organisation, her understanding of social issues and her compassion for others.
As a Labour councillor in Highgate during the 1970s, she was partly responsible for saving and converting into liveable homes Victorian streets in Highgate Newtown. She also worked to safeguard the future of Lauderdale House and Burgh House for community use – a legacy of her time as a councillor.
Born in Islington in 1923, her father, Dennis, was a French polisher working in the law courts. He was a trade unionist and campaigned to raise the status of artisans who worked for government offices. Her mother, Mina, was a seamstress.
Jean’s childhood was spent in Finchley and was a mix of city dwelling and country living. At the bottom of the garden were woods and fields, which she played in with her cousin Doris, who lived nearby.
A bright student who passed her 11 Plus, Jean was encouraged by her father to train for the civil service and took the exam aged 16, but the outbreak of war changed the terms of entry.
As a teenager, Jean started a group called the Highgate youth club: they would invite a public figure to lecture to the group before putting away the chairs and having a dance.
As she reached 18, she decided that, instead of waiting to be called up, she would join the Wrens – according to Oliver, she chose the service as she thought the Wrens had the nicest uniform.
At end of hostilities Jean attended the London School of Economics, studying social sciences. This too underlined her socialism, having been tutored by Harold Laski, and then worked as a welfare officer for the Land Settlement Association, overseeing the transfer of land to displaced miners in the Sussex.
After two years Jean returned to London, and met with friends of hers from her days in the Wrens. They lived together in Kensington, and it was here she would meet her future husband, the architect Oliver Cox.
She began work as a housing welfare officer, while Oliver was working for on social housing projects for the London County Council.
It was a shared interest that was underlined by their socialist principles, and one that would become one of the main focuses of their work together.
The couple married in 1953 and moved to a flat in Highgate, and then, when their first son Paul was born, decamped to a house in Grove Terrace, Parliament Hill Fields, where Jean set up a tenants association.
Aware of her own experience of bringing up three children and continuing to have professional interests, she established a pressure group to further the role of part-time social workers, and then rolled the idea out to counter a national teacher shortage.
Her campaign, dubbed ‘Women Who Want To Teach’, changed government policy. She also became involved with other political causes, establishing the St Pancras wing of the Campaign for the Advancement of State Education.
This work brought her to Jamaica, where her study on low income housing in Trench Town led on to similar projects in Port Said, the old city of Tunis, and the Parisian suburbs.
The pair retired from their job in 1980 and launched into a new project, one which would lead to art work by Oliver being adopted by the Jamaican government on the back of the country’s $500 bill.
Her interest in Camden politics continued after standing down from the council in the 1978, her Grove Terrace home being used through out the 1980s and 1990s as a Labour Party committee room, with hordes of activists descending during election time to mastermind election day activities.
She is survived by her husband Oliver, three children Paul, Jane and Lucy, and three grandchildren.
Dan Carrier |
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